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New York Post
12 minutes ago
- Politics
- New York Post
Federal judge protects Kilmar Abrego Garcia from deportation by Trump admin
A federal judge in Maryland issued an emergency ruling Wednesday blocking the Trump administration from immediately taking Salvadorian migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia into ICE custody for 72 hours after he is released from criminal custody in Nashville, Tennessee — attempting to slow, if only temporarily, a case at the center of a legal and political maelstrom. U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said in her order that the government must refrain from immediately taking Abrego into ICE custody pending release from criminal custody in Tennessee, and ordered he be returned to the ICE Order of Supervision at the Baltimore Field Office— the closest ICE facility near the district of Maryland where Abrego was arrested earlier this year. Advertisement Xinis said at an evidentiary hearing this month that she would take action soon, in anticipation of a looming detention hearing for Abrego Garcia in his criminal case. She said she planned to issue the order with sufficient time to block the Trump administration's stated plans to immediately begin the process of deporting Abrego Garcia again upon release — this time to a third country such as Mexico or South Sudan. 9 This undated photo provided by CASA, an immigrant advocacy organization, in April 2025, shows Kilmar Abrego Garcia. AP Xinis's order said the additional time will ensure Abrego can raise any credible fears of removal to a third country, and via 'the appropriate channels in the immigration process.' She also ordered the government to provide Abrego and his attorneys with 'immediate written notice' of plans to transport him to a third country, again with the 72-hour notice period, 'so that Abrego Garcia may assert claims of credible fear or seek any other relief available to him under the law and the Constitution.' Xinis said in her order Wednesday that the 72-hour notice period is necessary 'to prevent a repeat of Abrego Garcia's unlawful deportation to El Salvador by way of third-country removal.' Advertisement 'Defendants have taken no concrete steps to ensure that any prospective third country would not summarily return Abrego Garcia to El Salvador in an end-run around the very withholding order that offers him uncontroverted protection,' she said. 9 Maryland Federal Judge Paula Xinis. Senate Judiciary Committee The order from Xinis, who presided over Abrego Garcia's civil case, was ultimately handed down on Wednesday just two minutes after a federal judge in Nashville — U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw — issued a separate order, upholding a lower judge's decision that Abrego should be released from criminal custody pending trial in January. Crenshaw said in his order that the government failed to provide 'any evidence that there is something in Abrego's history at warrants detention.' Advertisement The plans, which Xinis ascertained over the course of a multi-day evidentiary hearing earlier this month, capped an exhausting, 19-week legal saga in the case of Abrego Garcia that spanned two continents, multiple federal courts, including the Supreme Court, and inspired countless hours of news coverage. 9 The indictment of Kilmar Abrego Garcia that charges him with transporting people who were in the United States illegally, is photographed, Friday, June 6, 2025, in Washington. AP Still, it ultimately yielded little in the way of new answers, and Xinis likened the process to 'nailing Jell-O to a wall,' and 'beating a frustrated and dead horse,' among other things. 'We operate as government of laws,' she scolded lawyers for the Trump administration in one of many terse exchanges. 'We don't operate as a government of 'take my word for it.'' Advertisement Xinis had repeatedly floated the notion of a temporary restraining order, or TRO, to ensure certain safeguards were in place to keep Abrego Garcia in ICE custody, and appeared to agree with his attorneys that such an order is likely needed to prevent their client from being removed again, without access to counsel or without a chance to appeal his country of removal. 'I'm just trying to understand what you're trying to do,' Xinis said on more than one occasion, growing visibly frustrated. 9 Kilmar Abrego Garcia is seen wearing a Chicago Bulls hat in this handout image obtained by Reuters on April 9, 2025. via REUTERS 'I'm deeply concerned that if there's no restraint on you, Abrego will be on another plane to another country,' she told the Justice Department, noting pointedly that 'that's what you've done in other cases.' Those concerns were echoed repeatedly by Abrego Garcia's attorneys in a court filing earlier this month. They noted the number of times that the Trump administration has appeared to have undercut or misrepresented its position before the court in months past, as Xinis attempted to ascertain the status of Abrego Garcia in El Salvador, and what efforts, if any, the Trump administration was making to comply with a court order to facilitate his return. The Trump administration, who reiterated their belief that the case is no longer in her jurisdiction, will almost certainly move to immediately appeal the restraining order to a higher court. 9 Supporters of Kilmar Abrego Garcia rally outside the U.S. District Court for Maryland during a hearing on his case on July 10, 2025 in Greenbelt, Maryland. Getty Images Advertisement The order comes two weeks after an extraordinary, multi-day evidentiary hearing in Greenbelt, Maryland, where Xinis sparred with Trump administration officials as she attempted to make sense of their remarks and ascertain their next steps as they look to deport Abrego Garcia to a third country. She said she planned to issue the order before the date that Abrego could possibly be released from federal custody— a request made by lawyers for Abrego Garcia, who asked the court for more time in criminal custody, citing the many countries he might suffer persecution in — and concerns about what legal status he would have in the third country of removal. Without legal status in Mexico, Xinis said, it would likely be a 'quick road' to being deported by the country's government to El Salvador, in violation of the withholding of removal order. And in South Sudan, another country DHS is apparently considering, lawyers for Abrego noted the State Department currently has a Level 4 advisory in place discouraging U.S. travel due to violence and armed conflict. Advertisement 9 A rally sign is seen during a news conference outside the federal courthouse before a hearing for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, Wednesday, July 16, 2025, in Nashville, Tennessee. AP Americans who do travel there should 'draft a will' beforehand and designate insurance beneficiaries, according to official guidance on the site. In court, both in July and in earlier hearings, Xinis struggled to keep her own frustration and her incredulity at bay after months of back-and-forth with Justice Department attorneys. Xinis has presided over Abrego Garcia's civil case since March, when he was deported to El Salvador in violation of an existing court order in what Trump administration officials described as an 'administrative error.' Advertisement She spent hours pressing Justice Department officials, over the course of three separate hearings, for details on the government's plans for removing Abrego Garcia to a third country — a process she likened to 'trying to nail Jell-O to a wall.' 9 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 in this handout image obtained by Reuters on April 9, 2025. via REUTERS Xinis chastised the Justice Department this month for presenting a DHS witness to testify under oath about ICE's plans to deport Abrego Garcia, fuming that the official, Thomas Giles, 'knew nothing' about his case, and made no effort to ascertain answers — despite his rank as ICE's third-highest enforcement official. The four hours of testimony he provided was 'fairly stunning,' and 'insulting to her intelligence,' Xinis said. Advertisement Ultimately, the court would not allow the 'unfettered release' of Abrego Garcia pending release from federal custody in Tennessee without 'full-throated assurances' from the Trump administration that it will keep Abrego Garcia in ICE custody for a set period of time and locally, Xinis said, to ensure immigration officials do not 'spirit him away to Nome, Alaska.' During the July hearing, Judge Xinis notably declined to weigh in on the request for sanctions filed by lawyers for Abrego Garcia, but alluded to it in her ruling Wednesday. 'Defendants' defiance and foot-dragging are, to be sure, the subject of a separate sanctions motion,' she said in the ruling — indicating further steps could be taken as she attempts to square months of differing statements from Trump officials. 9 A sign is placed outside the federal courthouse where a hearing for Kilmar Abrego Garcia is taking place, during which a judge will determine the conditions of his release, in Nashville, Tennessee, U.S., July 16, 2025. REUTERS 'The Court will not recount this troubling history in detail, other than to note Defendants' persistent lack of transparency with the tribunal adds to why further injunctive relief is warranted,' she said. The Justice Department, after a short recess, declined to agree, prompting Xinis to proceed with her plans for the TRO. Xinis told the court that ultimately, 'much delta' remains between where they ended things in court, and what she is comfortable with, given the government's actions in the past. This was apparent on multiple occasions Friday, when Xinis told lawyers for the Trump administration that she 'isn't buying' their arguments or doesn't 'have faith' in the statements they made — reflecting an erosion of trust that could prove damaging in the longer-term. 9 Supporters rally for Kilmar Abrego Garcia's return from El Salvador prior to a status hearing outside the federal court house in Greenbelt, Maryland, USA 16 May 2025. SHAWN THEW/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock The hearings this week capped months of back-and-forth between Xinis and the Trump administration, as she tried, over the course of 19 weeks, to track the status of a single migrant deported erroneously by the Trump administration to El Salvador—and to trace what attempts, if any, they had made facilitate his return to the U.S. Xinis previously took aim at what she deemed to be the lack of information submitted to the court as part of an expedited discovery process she ordered this year, describing the government's submissions as 'vague, evasive and incomplete'— and which she said demonstrated 'willful and bad faith refusal to comply with discovery obligations.' On Friday, she echoed this view. 'You have taken the presumption of regularity and you've destroyed it, in my view,' Xinis said.
Time Magazine
15-07-2025
- Politics
- Time Magazine
Detained by ICE on Her Honeymoon: Ward Sakiek's Saga
Ward Sakeik stands in a Dallas kitchen making watermelon juice. For 140 days, someone else decided what and when she would eat. The 22-year-old wedding photographer spent the last five months in ICE detention after being arrested on her own honeymoon. Recently released and reunited with her family, the simple act of planning her day feels overwhelming. "I feel like I'm so behind in life," she says. Her case became a rallying point for immigration advocates in a time of tumult and uncertainty for anyone not born in the U.S. But Sakeik says her experience was all the more bewildering because every question she faced had been resolved over a decade ago. She and her husband had planned their honeymoon carefully, specifically choosing destinations within the territory of the United States because of her immigration status. Sakeik is stateless. Born in Saudi Arabia, she moved to the U.S. with her family when she was nine. Saudi Arabia does not automatically grant citizenship to children born on its soil, and acquiring citizenship there—especially with non-Saudi parents or lineage—is a rare and difficult process. Sakeik's family is originally from the Gaza Strip, which along with the West Bank and East Jerusalem is regarded by international law as Occupied Palestinian Territory.' Their family never flew under the radar ever since day one,' says Sakeik's husband, Taahir Shaikh, a U.S. citizen. 'America knew who they were when they came into the border. They went through the court system. They were given due process. They complied with their deportation orders.' Those orders had been suspended as a matter of routine. Shaikh says the family was granted an Order of Supervision (OSUP) by ICE, a system allowing noncitizens awaiting deportation or other immigration proceedings to stay in the U.S. under certain restrictions—such as regular check-ins—rather than being held in detention. ' She's gone to the same ICE processing center every year her entire life for 14 years,' Taahir says. ICE officers would mention how she's grown up since they had last seen her, and even congratulated her on her college graduation in 2023, he recalls. Her stateless status left her vulnerable. 'She doesn't have an embassy or a consulate back home that can fight for her legal protection,' Taahir Shaikh notes. Read More: Barred from the Birth of His Son, Mahmoud Khalil's Case Brings Family Separation into FocusThe couple planned their honeymoon accordingly. "I told my husband… we're gonna have to travel within the U.S., even though I would love to go to Turkey," Sakeik recalls. "So we decided that we're going to do two weeks in the Virgin Islands because it's U.S. territory." At the Dallas airport, airline employees confirmed their plan was sound. Upon their return, they planned to continue their honeymoon at national parks in Arizona and stayed nine days in the Virgin Islands, but as they prepared to fly home, Sakeik was detained by ICE—first at the St. Thomas Airport, then again when they reached Miami. What followed was months of confusion. In St. Thomas, a Customs and Border Protection officer told her that if she could provide proof of her scheduled reporting date with ICE, she would be released. She did, but 'I still was detained regardless.' History did not seem to matter. "For the last 14 or 15 years that I've been here in America, I was never hiding from ICE. They know exactly where I [was]. They know where I live, they know my family, they know the air I breathe, they know everything," she says. Even when she was transferred to Dallas facilities, the disconnect persisted. 'They're my people,' she recalls thinking. 'They know what's going on.' But the officers who held her seemed unaware of her record. 'When a lot of them were confused, that's when I [thought], who the hell do I blame?" Sakeik was held in three different facilities during her detention, the longest at the El Valle Detention Center outside of McAllen, Texas. There, dust would visibly fall whenever the lights would turn on. When she complained to facility management, "he literally told me, 'you are in the detention center. What do you expect?' The dormitory housed about 100 women, mostly Latina immigrants and some Russians, most of whom wore blue uniforms indicating they were not considered criminals. Sakeik calls them 'blues.' 'We're all different. The way we came [here], the way our lives are, what we live for, what we've achieved, our jobs, and what documents we have.' The names of previous detainees were carved onto the mental bunks. "On my bed alone, I have probably had like a hundred names.' After years of running her own business and making her own decisions, Sakeik found herself subject to someone else's routine for every aspect of her day. She found solace in Just Dance DVD's, which also kept her active. Then, on June 12, she was awakened in the middle of the night and told to gather her things. An official told her she was about to be flown 'to the Israeli border' on a flight her husband later learned was scheduled for Egypt. But waiting on the tarmac, she was told she was staying after all. Twenty days later, on July 2, Sakeik was eating Maruchan ramen with a friend when an ICE officer called her aside. "I went outside and I saw that he was holding documents. So I literally thought in my head, he's about to make me sign another travel document to God knows wherever," she recalls. "And then he looked at me, 'Hey, you're being released.' I started laughing. I was like, yeah, you think so?" "I didn't believe that I was getting released up until I hugged my husband… that's how far off it was from me. I didn't believe it. I didn't trust anybody." But after more than 10 years in America, Sakeik had a community to vouch for her. Her release came after a sustained advocacy campaign organized by her husband and people who knew her. Taahir had started a social media page, and with their legal team started a petition to present to their local congresswoman. Taahir also gathered testimonials from people from her mosque, past university professors, business partners, friends, and her photography teacher. Imam Omar Suleiman, founding president of the Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research, got their story out to millions, sharing Sakeik's story in a Friday sermon. 'She literally embraced every opportunity the country gave her,' Taahir says. 'She went through the American school system. This is a girl who has an annual blood donation record at her local Carter BloodCare. Every single client or person that's interacted with her can vouch that her heart is [pure].' It is also more devout. The time in detention brought Sakeik closer to her faith; she decided to start practicing wearing a hijab. "That's the biggest blessing,' she says, 'because I promise you, whenever your freedom has been taken away from you and you have your time with God, you really start to reflect." Sakeik now has an insider's view of the Trump Administration's sweeping immigration enforcement campaign, which extends beyond those with criminal cases to target undocumented individuals regardless of their legal or compliance status. To satisfy presidential demands, field offices are directed to meet new daily arrest quotas—75 arrests per office—raising agency-wide targets to 1,200–1,500 arrests per day, up from only about a few More: Can Trump Deport U.S. Citizens Like Elon Musk and Zohran Mamdani?Her experience reflects an agency with spotty internal communication. "Some of the ICE officers themselves would even tell me, 'I don't know why you're here,'' Sakeik recalls. 'Some of them would straight up tell me, 'If it was up to us, we'd release you.'"She's planning to reopen her photography business in the fall but is taking time to readjust to life outside detention. "I sleep a lot. I stay mainly indoors,' she says. 'It's just the same routine I had in detention, I'm having difficulty letting it go." She shops online to avoid the anxiety produced by visiting stores. "Everything in Costco is considered contraband at the detention center.' But Sakeik also has pledged not to forget what she left behind. "I know how excited I was to receive a letter in there. I would literally fly off of my bunk when the mail lady would come," she says. Sakeik plans to start a letter-writing campaign to support women still inside, and speak for them in now that she's free. "You know, there're plenty more women detained that unfortunately are not getting the same media attention or are too afraid to speak up," she says. "So if I can be that one voice… then yes, why not?"
