Kilmar Abrego Garcia deportation to Liberia raises urgent questions about U.S. immigration power, due process, and whether migrants can be removed to countries they’ve never lived in.
He beat their system and they want revenge. No different motivations than when he went after Tish James. Different outcomes if he has his way, but similar reasoning.
The Trump administration is moving forward with its plan to swiftly remove Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Liberia as soon as a court allows.
In a series of filings on Friday, administration officials asked a judge to dissolve a preliminary injunction that bars them from re-detaining Abrego Garcia and deporting him.
Abrego Garcia, a native of El Salvador who had been living in Maryland with his wife and children, was deported last March to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison — despite a 2019 court order barring his deportation to that country due to fear of persecution. The Trump administration claimed he was a member of the criminal gang MS-13, which he and his attorneys deny.
He was brought back to the U.S. in June to face the human smuggling charges, to which he pleaded not guilty.
Although Abrego Garcia has said he’s willing to be sent to Costa Rica, Acting Immigrations and Customs Enforcement Director Todd Lyons said in a memo filed in court that he has “decided to disregard” that request and intends to send him to Liberia if Abrego Garcia is ordered removed from the U.S.
In part, Lyons said Abrego Garcia initially had designated his home country of El Salvador as his chosen place to be sent during his initial removal proceedings in 2019 before a judge swept his deportation finding that his life could be at risk if he were to return there. He then attempted to designate Costa Rica as the country of removal six years later.
“Neither the statute nor the regulations permit an alien to designate a country of removal beyond the initial opportunity granted in removal proceedings. If, as here, an alien were permitted to designate a country of removal years after the conclusion of removal proceedings, an alien could avoid ever being removed by endlessly designating new countries of removal,” Lyons wrote.
Lyons also said the administration had already negotiated Abrego Garcia’s removal with the government of Liberia and that abandoning that agreement “could cast doubt on the diplomatic reliability of the United States.”
The memo went on to say: “Accordingly, after careful consideration, I have decided that Mr. Abrego Garcia’s removal to Costa Rica at this time would be ‘prejudicial to the United States.'”
In a sworn declaration, a top ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations official said the government has gone as far as to have the contractor that handles removals to Liberia draw up a “mock itinerary,” which showed Abrego Garcia could be on a flight to Liberia within five days of the government’s request.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia: The Salvadoran who has put the Trump government in crisis
