US judge to order release of wrongly deported Salvadoran migrant pending trial

By AFP
June 24, 2025
Kilmar Abrego-Garcia, a Salvadoran national, speaks with a Tennessee Highway Patrol officer during a traffic stop on Interstate 40 in Tennessee, US November 30, 2022 in a still image from body camera video. —Reuters
Kilmar Abrego-Garcia, a Salvadoran national, speaks with a Tennessee Highway Patrol officer during a traffic stop on Interstate 40 in Tennessee, US November 30, 2022 in a still image from body camera video. —Reuters

WASHINGTON: A federal judge, in a setback for the Trump administration, has said she plans to order the release of a wrongly deported Salvadoran migrant while he awaits trial on human smuggling charges.

Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, 29, was summarily deported to a maximum security prison in El Salvador in March and brought back to the United States this month. His case has become a key test of President Donald Trump´s hardline deportation policies.

Abrego Garcia was immediately arrested on his return and charged in Nashville, Tennessee, with smuggling undocumented migrants around the United States between 2016 and 2025.