Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a sheet metal apprentice and SMART union member from Maryland is being held in immigration detention in Tennessee while fighting to stay in the USA.
The judge ruled he could remain in jail in Tennessee to prevent the Justice Department from deporting him again based on false charges.
He had been returned to the U.S. after Immigration and Customs Enforcement flew him to El Salvador where he was imprisoned for three months. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered him returned to the USA.
“It’s been 106 days since my husband was abducted by the Trump administration and separated from my family,” Jennifer Vasquez Sura told a press conference before the June 27 ruling. “We’ve had to stand and plead for his liberation. He has missed birthdays, graduations, and Father’s Day, and today our wedding anniversary. Today, in honor of Kilmar, I will celebrate our fight, and the fight of all those who stood with us and refuse to give up until he is free.”
Abrego Garcia was denied his constitutional right to defend himself. His deportation violated a 2019 court order barring his removal to El Salvador, in what the administration called “an administrative error.”
The felony charges he now faces — over 100 charges of interstate human smuggling for financial gain between 2016 and 2025 — are built around a single 2022 traffic stop. He was not arrested but issued a ticket for driving without a valid license. Garcia’s union, SMART; stand in solidarity with him as the Trump administration falsely wants to prosecute him in order to deport Garcia again.
