 "Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran migrant who lived in the U.S. legally with a work permit and was erroneously deported to El Salvador, is seen wearing a Chicago Bulls hat, in this handout image obtained by Reuters on April 9, 2025. File image/ Reuters")
The man who was mistakenly deported from Maryland to El Salvador by US President Donald Trump’s administration in March returned to the United States on Friday, only to face criminal charges. In a press briefing on Friday, the US attorney general, Pam Bondi, announced that a federal grand jury in Tennessee indicted 29-year-old Kilmar Ábrego García on counts of illegally smuggling undocumented people as well as of conspiracy to commit that crime.
“Our government presented El Salvador with an arrest warrant, and they agreed to return him to our country,” Bondi said of Ábrego García during the presser. She went on to thank Salvadorian president, Nayib Bukele, “for agreeing to return him to our country to face these very serious charges”.
“This is what American justice looks like upon completion of his sentence,” Bondi added. Meanwhile, in a statement to The Hill on Friday, Ábrego García’s lawyer, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, accused the Trump administration of “disappearing his client to a foreign prison,” calling it a “violation of a court order. “Now, after months of delay and secrecy, they’re bringing him back, not to correct their error but to prosecute him,” he added.
“This shows that they were playing games with the court all along. Due process means the chance to defend yourself before you’re punished, not after,” the lawyer explained. Sandoval-Moshenberg argued that the White House’s treatment of his client was “an abuse of power, not justice”.
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Sandoval-Moshenber called on Ábrego García to face the same immigration judge who had granted him federal protection in the past against the order of the administration to deport him to El Salvador. He said that it should be done “to ensure that his case is handled as it would have been had he not been improperly sent there". He also mentioned the fact that this is what “the US Supreme Court ordered back in April.
Meanwhile, Bondi on Friday noted that federal grand jurors found that Ábrego García “has played a significant role” in an abusive smuggling ring that had operated for nearly a decade. The attorney mentioned that if convicted, Ábrego García would be deported to El Salvador after completing his sentence in the US.
It is pertinent to note that, as per the record filed in the court , Ábrego García entered the US without permission in about 2011 while fleeing gang violence in El Salvador. Despite a judicial order that provided him protection from being deported, on 15 March, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials deported him to El Salvador after arresting him in Maryland.
He was held in the so-called Centre for Terrorism Confinement, a controversial mega-prison better known as Cecot . It is important to note that Ábrego García had no criminal record in the US before the indictment was announced on Friday, according to court documents.
Not only this, but the Trump administration subsequently admitted that Ábrego García’s deportation was an “ administrative error ”. However, he was repeatedly painted as an MS-13 gang member on television – a claim which his wife, a US citizen, and his attorneys staunchly reject.
With inputs from agencies.