The United States Supreme Court on Thursday directed President Donald Trump’s administration to facilitate the return of an Salvadoran man who was wrongly deported to El Salvador in March.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia was among more than 200 people sent to a massive anti-terrorism prison in El Salvador, as part of a in cooperation with El Salvador’s government.
After Abrego Garcia was deported, lawyers with the US Justice Department admitted that it was due to an “administrative error.”
His case is part of larger over the due process of law in carrying out deportations based on alleged criminality.
Sent to prison ‘for no legal reason’
Following Abrego Garcia’s deportation, the US government on April 4 to return him to the US by Monday, but the Supreme Court put that order on hold following a request by the Trump administration to throw out the lower court’s ruling.
On Thursday, the Supreme Court upheld the decision and said that the judge’s order “properly requires the government to ‘facilitate’ Abrego Garcia’s release from custody in El Salvador and to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent to El Salvador.”
“To this day, the government has cited no basis in law for Abrego Garcia’s warrantless arrest, his removal to El Salvador, or his confinement in a Salvadoran prison. Nor could it,” liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a statement.
The administration had requested “an order from this court permitting it to leave Abrego Garcia, a husband and father without a criminal record, in a Salvadoran prison for no reason recognized by the law,” the statement continued.
Lower court judge Paula Xinis, who had issued the initial order in question, said Thursday the US must “take all available steps to facilitate the return of Abrego Garcia to the United States as soon as possible.”
The district court judge has set a hearing in a Maryland federal court for Friday, saying she wants to hear from the government about what steps, if any, it has taken to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return.
The had argued it did not have jurisdiction to have Abrego Garcia released now that he is on Salvadoran soil.
It called the lower courts’ orders “unprecedented and indefensible” and a “demand that the United States let a member of a foreign terrorist organization into America tonight.”
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Wednesday that her agency was “confident” that the people being held in the El Salvadoran prison “should be there, and they should stay there for the rest of their lives,” news site Axios reported.
What are the details of the case?
Abrego Garcia had been living in the eastern state of Maryland, and had received a work permit and protected legal status in 2019 over “well-founded fear” of gang persecution in his home country.
That same year, local police had accused him of being affiliated with the notorious MS-13 gang, something which he has continually denied. Based on these claims, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement had listed Abrego Garcia as a “certified” gang member.
His attorneys say Abrego Garcia was never charged with a crime.
Nevertheless, he was stopped and detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers on March 12, and deported in one of the three high-profile flights to El Salvador, along with other alleged gang members.
Garcia’s family challenged the legality of the deportation at the US district court which led to the April 4 ruling.
Garcia is married to an American citizen with whom he is raising a child, along with two children from his wife’s previous marriage.
Edited by: Wesley Rahn
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