U.S. ICE plans to send Kilmar Armando Ábrego García to Eswatini after the Maryland resident expressed fear of being deported to Uganda.
Immigrations and Customs Enforcement attorneys wrote in a letter on Friday that Ábrego Garcia’s fear of being deported to Uganda was “hard to take seriously.” The letter said the Maryland resident had listed at least 22 countries where he feared persecution and torture if he was deported there.
The letter comes after Baltimore immigration enforcement detained Ábrego García on Aug. 25. Ábrego García’s case has drawn international attention and has become a focal point in the debate over Trump’s mass deportation efforts and a test of his administration’s legal power.
He fled gang threats in El Salvador as a teenager in 2011 and lived in Maryland for more than a decade before ICE deported him to El Salvador in March. A 2019 immigration court order banned his removal to that country.
He was held in El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center until a federal court in Maryland ordered the Trump administration to bring him back in April. The Supreme Court declined the administration’s emergency appeal, and he was returned to the U.S. in June.
[Judge temporarily blocks ICE from deporting Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to Uganda]
Upon his return, Ábrego García faced federal human smuggling charges. They stemmed from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee, where officers noted he was driving nine other passengers who all had the same home addresses and no luggage. He was allowed to continue driving with a warning.
After returning to the U.S., Ábrego García was held in federal custody under the charges in Tennessee until his release on Aug. 22. The Trump administration said it hopes to deport him before the trial. It alleges he is an MS-13 gang member.
“While ICE is holding Kilmar Ábrego García and keeping his lawyers in the dark as to what is next for him, Administration officials continue to spread lies about the facts in his case,” U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md) wrote in an Aug. 25 news release. The senator has met with Ábrego Garcia and his family multiple times since he was first deported.
Ábrego García is also seeking asylum in the U.S. He was previously denied in 2019, but filed a motion in August to reopen the case since he was deported and has re-entered the country. The Trump administration has threatened in court filings to pursue deporting Ábrego García to El Salvador if his asylum case was re-opened, the Associated Press reported Friday.
