"Abrego Garcia is, of course, the man the Trump administration famously and wrongly deported to an El Salvadoran slave labor camp and then spent the better part of a year trying to punish for embarrassing them by surviving. U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ruled that Abrego Garcia cannot be detained again by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, because the statutory 90-day removal period that would allow ICE to hold him expired "long ago.""
"'Respondents' reading would also conveniently erase this last year of Abrego Garcia's Detention,' she wrote, adding that the Trump administration 'cannot alter substantive rights or rewrite history.' Since August 2025, ICE has floated what Judge Xinis described as 'phantom removals to three (maybe four) African countries,' that were 'empty threats' with 'no real chance of success.' Meanwhile, the one country that has consistently offered to accept Abrego Garcia and that he is willing to go to (Costa Rica), has been deliberately ignored."
A federal court rejected the government's attempt to revive detention authority over Kilmar Abrego Garcia after his wrongful deportation to an El Salvadoran slave labor camp. U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ruled Abrego Garcia cannot be detained by ICE because the statutory 90-day removal period that would permit detention expired long ago and retroactive corrections to immigration records cannot restore expired authority. Since August 2025 ICE proposed 'phantom removals' to several African countries that had no realistic chance of success while ignoring Costa Rica, which consistently offered to accept him. The court found the pattern showed vindictive conduct aimed at punishing and making an example of Abrego Garcia rather than genuine removal efforts.
Read at Above the Law
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