Joe.My.God. LGBT News
The Washington Post reports:
A federal judge on Tuesday said she will require Trump administration officials to produce in-depth details about the U.S. governments attempts, or lack thereof, to return a Maryland resident who was apprehended by immigration authorities and mistakenly sent to a notorious prison in El Salvador.
The decision from U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis to require documents and written explanations marks another escalation in the legal showdown with the White House. The case has widespread implications, with Justice Department lawyers arguing that the judge lacks the authority to force them to coordinate with the Salvadoran government to bring Kilmar Abrego García back to the United States.
“It’s going to be two weeks of intense discovery,” Xinis told Justice Department attorneys at the hearing. Justice Department lawyers have repeatedly bucked Xinis’s orders to provide information about what the Trump administration is doing to facilitate the return of Abrego García, 29. That tone of defiance was underscored earlier this week by both President Donald Trump and Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele.
CBS News reports:
A federal judge on Tuesday admonished the Department of Justice for not complying with her order to facilitate the release of a Maryland man who the Trump administration admitted had been mistakenly deported to a prison in El Salvador. “We have to give process to both sides, but we’re going to move… there will be no tolerance for gamesmanship or grandstanding,” U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said at the start of a hearing in the case involving Kilmer Abrego Garcia, who was sent to El Salvador last month.
Shortly before the start of the proceeding, Joseph Mazzarra, acting general counsel of DHS, said in a declaration that the department would facilitate Abrego Garcia’s presence in the U.S. in accordance with established procedures “if he presents at a port of entry.” Mazzarra said that if Abrego Garcia does show up at a port of entry, he would be detained by the DHS and either removed to a third country or be stripped of a legal protection that he was granted in 2019, which forbid immigration authorities from removing him to his home country of El Salvador.
Reuters reports:
Xinis said she would require the Trump administration to produce documents and have officials sit for depositions by April 23 to explain steps they have taken to secure Abrego Garcia’s return.
The case is one of several that have sparked concerns among Democrats and some legal analysts that Republican President Donald Trump’s administration is willing to disregard the judiciary, an independent and equal branch of government.
The Trump administration has accused the judiciary of overstepping and interfering with the executive branch’s ability to conduct foreign policy. Before the hearing, a crowd of protesters outside the courthouse chanted “Bring Kilmar home,” as they listened to his wife, Jennifer Vasquez Sura, urge the U.S. and El Salvador to return him.
There’s more at every link above.
Judge says Justice Department must provide details of attempts to return wrongly deported man: The order for records and, potentially, depositions of Trump administration officials further a legal standoff in the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia https://t.co/KHAWcP5tHp
— David Alexander (@davidalexander5) April 15, 2025