Judge denies government's motion to detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia
A magistrate judge in Tennessee has denied the government's motion to detain Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the mistakenly deported Salvadoran native who was brought back to the United States earlier this month.
In her order on Sunday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes said the court "will give Abrego the due process that he is guaranteed."
Judge Holmes scheduled a hearing for Wednesday to review the conditions of release.
Abrego Garcia faces criminal charges for allegedly transporting undocumented migrants within the U.S.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
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Newsweek
41 minutes ago
- Newsweek
Kilmar Abrego Garcia Scores Win Over Trump Admin in Emergency Appeal
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. On Friday, Robert E. McGuire, acting U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee, ruled that Kilmar Abrego Garcia should remain in jail at the request of his own legal team who said they feared he could be deported if released from custody. Newsweek contacted the Department of Homeland Security for comment on Saturday via email outside of regular office hours. Why It Matters Garcia attracted widespread attention in March when he was deported to his native El Salvador in what federal officials later admitted was an "administrative error." The Trump administration insists Garcia is a member of the MS-13 criminal gang, which he and his family have denied. Whilst being held in a Salvadorian mega prison, Garcia was visited by Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen, and his case became a cause against the backdrop of Trump's vow to crackdown on foreign criminal gangs and illegal immigration. What To Know In June, Garcia was returned to the U.S. where he was charged with human trafficking, with Attorney General Pam Bondi saying he played a "significant role" in a people smuggling ring. Garcia pled not guilty to the charges and his legal team said the federal government's actions against him amount to an "abuse of power." Originally, Garcia entered the U.S. illegally as a teenager, but he was granted protection from deportation by an immigration judge who said he could face violence from gangs in his native country. On June 22, Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes of Nashville ordered Garcia to be released on bail, saying she did not believe he was a flight risk or a threat to the wider community. This decision was appealed by the federal government, but U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw of Tennessee backed Holmes's ruling and said Garcia could be released. Kilmar Abrego Garcia pictured during a meeting with Senator Chris Van Hollen whilst in custody at an undisclosed location on April 17, 2025 in San Salvador, El Salvador. Kilmar Abrego Garcia pictured during a meeting with Senator Chris Van Hollen whilst in custody at an undisclosed location on April 17, 2025 in San Salvador, El Salvador. Sen. Van Hollen's Office via Getty Images/GETTY However, Garcia's legal team itself requested he remain in custody, saying they feared he would be deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) if released from prison. In a motion filed on Friday, his attorneys wrote: "The irony of this request is not lost on anyone." The attorneys said there had been "contradictory statements" from the Department of Justice (DOJ) which in a court hearing in Maryland on Thursday indicated Garcia would be deported to a third country. However, the same day, a DOJ spokesperson informed the Associated Press that Garcia would face trial before being deported. Garcia's attorneys on Friday requested that he be held in jail until a July 16 court hearing in which a request from prosecutors to revoke his release order prior to trial will be heard. The trafficking charges against Garcia originate from a 2022 incident in which police said they stopped him for speeding in Tennessee, then found nine passengers in his vehicle without luggage. What People Are Saying In their motion submitted on Friday, Garcia's attorneys said: "Because DOJ has made directly contradictory statements on this issue in the last 18 hours, and because we cannot put any faith in any representation made on this issue by the DOJ, we respectfully request to delay the issuance of the release order." Referring to Garcia they added: "In a just world, he would not seek to prolong his detention further." On Thursday, DOJ spokesperson Chad Gilmartin told the Associated Press that Garcia "has been charged with horrific crimes, including trafficking children, and will not walk free in our country again." What Happens Next If he avoids deportation, Garcia will go on trial on human trafficking charges with prosecutors alleging he was involved with brining illegal migrants from Texas to other states between 2016 and 2025. He has pled guilty and denies any wrongdoing.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
I Saw Up Close Exactly Why Zohran Mamdani Won—and Why the Attacks Don't Work on Him
Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. This past May, I was outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office on Frelinghuysen Avenue in Newark, New Jersey, where ICE agents had detained Mayor Ras Baraka on a trespassing charge that would later be dropped. The crowd surged, chanting 'Free Mayor Baraka.' Then a familiar voice on a bullhorn cut through the clamor: Zohran Mamdani had taken the train in from New York to join the crowd. Protesters tightened around him. 'At a time when too many think the only option is surrender, we have to show the mayor that we have his back,' Mamdani said, the line aimed squarely at Democratic national leaders. Brad Lander and a handful of other Democrats spoke, too, but every camera, including mine, stayed locked on Mamdani. That burst of authority, in a state where he holds no office and can't even vote, convinced me of his potential, weeks before his upset of Andrew Cuomo in the New York City primary race for mayor. After clinching the Democratic nomination, Mamdani is now on track to become the first Muslim mayor of any U.S. city with a seven-figure population (New York dwarfs the populations of Michigan cities Dearborn or Hamtramck by 30 times). The office he's vying for commands a $100-billion-plus budget and the largest police force in the country. For Muslims like me, that hits hard. We've spent decades under New York Police Department surveillance and 'Demographics Unit' informants. I still remember the anti-terror squad that questioned me for hours about my connections to global jihad after I was arrested on a simple trespassing charge while taking photos. The symbolism of having a Muslim mayor is nice, sure. But it's the control over the NYPD that for me—and likely many more Muslims, especially those who had it much worse—makes Mamdani's victory feel like the impossible has suddenly become possible. Many believed the Democratic primary for mayor would merely be a formality for Cuomo, given his name recognition and despite his disgrace. In his run for the position, the former governor unleashed an establishment-tested megadonor-sponsored blitz, an attempt to win via moneyed brute force. Fix the City, one of several super PACs that funded his campaign, burned through $25 million carpet-bombing voters with TV ads and mailers that characterized his biggest opponent, Zohran, as dangerous. In response, Zohran countered with 50,000 volunteers as his campaign boasted of a remarkable '1.5 million doors knocked.' It's a strategy that appears to have paid off. It should have strategists on both sides of the aisle taking note. I saw that difference up close on the last night of Ramadan earlier this year. I'd tagged along as Mamdani ricocheted between Chaand Raat street fairs in the Bronx and Queens. My ears perked up when the same hushed questions about Gaza surfaced—where other Democrats I've covered slip into canned empathy or pivot to poll-tested 'balance,' Mamdani leaned in. He answered at length, never once glancing at a handler for permission, instead just jumping into clearly genuine thoughts on the moral cost of 'dodging hard truths.' Consultants told Kamala Harris to sidestep that very topic in 2024 and she lost to Donald Trump. I think last night's primary shows that voters can hear the difference between these too-carefully-crafted messages and what Mamdani did. Early analysis says Mamdani's upset was powered by a surge of younger voters. Not only did he go on the record backing the student encampments that Mayor Eric Adams condemned and dispatched an armored NYPD to clear, Mamdani pledged to honor the International Criminal Court's arrest warrant for Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Notably, when pressed on fealty to the current state of Israel, he refused to accept anything short of a state 'with equal rights for all.' Polling now shows young Americans likelier to oppose U.S. military aid to Israel than support it, a reality Cuomo and other establishment Democrats miss. By refusing to triangulate, Mamdani left his opponents only one card to play, the ugliest one: Islamophobia. That became the cri de coeur particularly of Republicans who will try to make this victory representative of some kind of imaginary threat. Minutes after the upset, right-wing figures were screaming 'terrorist.' Charlie Kirk invoked 9/11; Elise Stefanik warned of 'dangerous insanity.' The slurs echoed every insult Muslims here have absorbed since the 2000s, only this time it sounds more like pathetic cope than a denouncement of their neighbors. This primary feels like a rebuke of Islamophobia. Finally. Which brings me to the national collision course: Mamdani's win comes right on the heels of Donald Trump's attempts to edge closer to his dream to 'liberate' blue cities with fresh ICE raids, as he's being doing this summer in Los Angeles. Already, Trump has posted a rant on Truth Social about Mamdani's victory, calling him a 'Communist Lunatic.' What does it mean that New York Democrats just nominated the man who vows to 'stand up for our sanctuary city policies which have kept New Yorkers safe, and use every tool at the city's disposal to protect our immigrants'? The man who was literally on ICE's doorstep when his mayoral candidate opponent, Brad Lander, was cuffed and detained for contesting an ICE arrest in a New York City federal building? It means November now looks like a straight referendum on immigrant rights—and whether or not the Democratic Party has any fight left in them. What we saw this week is that Democratic voters certainly do. For Muslim New Yorkers, a massive electorate that also suffers from chronically low turnout, the idea that American politics is designed to exclude us has just been shattered. My own father once voted for George Bush, before the Iraq War. He now writes off voting as 'picking the lighter boot.' But Mamdani's surge might be the kind of thing to give my dad, and my many equally cynical Muslim friends, hope. Those same people are now basking in the delight of watching online trolls spiral as they belch 'terrorist' while reckoning with his likelihood to win the mayorship in November. In Democrat circles, Mamdani is catching more grief for being a socialist than for being Muslim, but once again, he is flipping derision into momentum. The Democratic base in New York isn't allergic to unapologetic Muslim identity—it's starving for moral coherence and material promises on affordability, housing, and public safety. Will Democrats on a national level take cues from his success? It has been a long time since those Democrats have proven themselves to be good listeners. At least Mamdani is speaking so clearly.
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
Mother arrested at LA court alongside six-year-old son with cancer sues Ice
A Honduran woman who sought asylum in the US is suing the Trump administration after immigration agents arrested her and her children, including her six-year-old son who was diagnosed with leukemia, at a Los Angeles immigration court. The woman, identified as 'Ms Z' in the lawsuit, and her nine-year-old daughter and six-year-old son have been in custody at a Texas detention facility for several weeks following their arrest. The government has placed them in expedited removal proceedings. Lawyers for the family say they were detained as part of the administration's 'nationwide campaign to summarily arrest law-abiding non-citizens when they attend their immigration court hearings'. Such arrests that are occurring at 'rates never before seen in the United States', according to the lawsuit filed this week. The lawsuit alleges the family is being detained in violation of their constitutional rights. The family applied to come to the US last year after fleeting their home country, where they faced 'imminent, menacing death threats'. They followed the 'lawful process', were paroled and went to live with the woman's mother, according to court documents provided by the Texas Civil Rights Project. The boy had been diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia at the age of three and underwent two years of successful treatment. While no more leukemia cells were found in his blood, his mother knew he would need regular monitoring and medical care and took him to multiple appointments once they settled in the US, according to the suit. After attending a court hearing in Los Angeles last month, where their case was suddenly dismissed, federal agents dressed as civilians arrested the family 'without any prior notice or warning' as they left the courtroom. They were not permitted to leave or make calls, the suit stated. The six-year-old, after seeing an agents gun, urinated on himself in fear and was left in the wet clothing for hours, according to the suit. Related: Trump is jailing immigrant families again. A mother, father and teen tell of 'anguish on a daily basis' The family has been held at a detention center in Dilley, Texas, since their arrest. The six-year-old missed a medical appointment related to his diagnosis earlier this month because of the family's incarceration. Detention has highly detrimental effects on the physical and mental health of children, potentially causing 'serious psychological trauma', and research has found that children at the Dilley facility suffer from 'inadequate medical care', according to the suit. The six-year-old has 'lost his appetite, experienced easy bruising and occasional bone pain, and looks pale, all of which are recognized as symptoms of leukemia,' the suit states, and his mother fears he is not receiving necessary medical care. Both children cry every night. DHS official Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to the Guardian that the boy has received regular treatment while in custody. 'First of all, at no time during detention is a detained individual denied emergency care,' said McLaughlin, DHS assistant secretary. 'Fortunately, the minor child in question has not undergone chemotherapy in over a year, and has been seen regularly by medical personnel since arriving at the Dilley facility.' 'The implication that Ice would deny a child the medical care they need is flatly FALSE, and it is an insult to the men and women of federal law enforcement. Ice ALWAYS prioritizes the health, safety, and wellbeing of all detainees in its care.' Lawyers are requesting the family's immediate release for medical treatment, and say that they are not a flight risk and have 'done everything the government asked of them'. 'The government is not detaining petitioners to serve its legitimate interests in protecting against danger or flight risk,' the court filing states. 'Instead, the government is detaining this family, along with countless others swept up in its courthouse arrests, for the illegitimate reason that they were easy to locate because they were where DHS told them to be to pursue humanitarian relief.' The family is suing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), the Department of Justice (DoJ) as well as the warden of the detention center, Ice's acting director, the homeland security secretary, and the attorney general, among others. McLaughlin said the family 'had chosen to appeal their case – which had already been thrown out by an immigration judge – and will remain in Ice custody until it is resolved'.
