Timeline: Abrego Garcia, deported in error, is back in US facing human trafficking charges

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, deported after "an administrative error" despite a protective order allowing him to remain in the United States, was imprisoned in El Salvador and has been returned to the U.S. where he will face criminal charges.

Federal court records show that Abrego Garcia, 29, has been indicted on two charges of unlawful transport of illegal aliens for financial gain, USA TODAY reported.

Abrego Garcia faces two counts of human trafficking in an indictment in a Tennessee federal court. The indictment, filed in May, says Abrego Garcia helped move undocumented migrants from Texas to the U.S. interior. The sealed indictment was made public June 6.

The Trump administration has accused Abrego Garcia of being a member of MS-13 gang. A U.S. district judge has disagreed, saying the administration has not provided evidence to support that accusation, according to court documents.

How controversy started: Courts order Abrego Garcia's return; administration says it's not possible

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis of Maryland said Abrego Garcia's deportation was "an illegal act" and ordered his return on April 4. The Trump administration appealed the order, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit denied the appeal.

The Supreme Court on April 10 told the Trump administration to "facilitate" the return of Abrego Garciato the U.S.

The Trump's administration has acknowledged the mistake. However, it says Abrego Garcia can't be returned to the U.S. because he's in Salvadoran custody. U.S. courts have no jurisdiction there, though the U.S. is paying the El Salvadoran government $6 million to house deportees from the U.S.

Abrego Garcia is not a U.S. citizen. A federal immigration judge granted him a legal protective order in 2019 that allowed him to stay in the U.S. The court's withholding of removal specifically prohibits Abrego Garcia's deportation to El Salvador, which he fled in 2006 to escape gang persecution, according to court documents.

His case sparked outrage across the country and become a rallying point for critics who question the legality and ethics of deportations under Trump.

How – and why – did Abrego Garcia come to the US?

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A review of court documents shows:

Abrego Garcia leaves El Salvador at age 16 to escape gang violence, according to court papers.

In court filings, Abrego Garcia later testifies he came to the U.S. because the Barrio 18 gang, a rival of MS-13, was extorting and threatening him and his family for their pupusa business in their neighborhood in San Salvador. He says he was also pressured to join the gang.

Abrego Garcia enters the U.S. illegally. Court documents say he enters the U.S. "without inspection." The term is used when a foreign national illegally enters the U.S. without permission. He joins an older brother, a U.S. citizen, in Maryland.

Abrego Garcia meets and begins a relationship with Jennifer Vasquez Sura, a U.S. citizen with two U.S.-citizen children from a prior relationship.

Vasquez Sura learns she is pregnant with their child. Abrego Garcia moves in with her and her two children. He works in construction.

Prince George’s County police arrest Abrego Garcia while he is soliciting employment at a Home Depot in Hyattsville, Maryland. Three other men are also arrested.

Police ask Abrego Garcia if he is a gang member. He says he is not. Officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrive and take him into custody.

Abrego Garcia is served with a Notice to Appear, the start of removal proceedings against him.

Abrego Garcia is charged as “an alien present in the United States without being admitted or paroled, or who arrives in the United States at any time or place other than as designated by the Attorney General.” There are no other charges.

Abrego Garcia appears for his first hearing in immigration court and asks for release on bond. His attorneys submit more than 70 pages of evidence to support his release.

ICE opposes his release, saying Abrego Garcia presents a danger to the community because local police had verified he is an active gang member.

ICE presents a police document that states Abrego Garcia was believed to be a gang member because he was wearing a Chicago Bulls hat and a hoodie.

It also says a confidential informant advised that Abrego Garcia was an active member of MS-13 with the "Western" clique.

Court filings by Abrego Garcia attorneys later cite the Department of Justice and the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office as identifying the “Western” clique operate in Brentwood, Long Island, in New York, a state Abrego Garcia reportedly never lived in.

Abrego Garcia and Vasquez Sura are married in the Howard Detention Center. Vasquez Sura is in her third trimester of pregnancy.

Abrego Garcia later files an I-589 application for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the United Nations Convention Against Torture with the Baltimore Immigration Court. His hearings are held on Aug. 9, 2019, and Sept. 27, 2019.

Vasquez Sura gives birth to a son who is later diagnosed with microtia, a congenital malformation of the external ear. Abrego Garcia remains in detention.

An immigration judge rules in Abrego Garcia’s favor. He finds that Abrego Garcia is liable for deportation but withholds his removal, agreeing that Abrego Garcia has established that he would likely be persecuted by gangs if he is returned to El Salvador.

ICE does not appeal the ruling. Abrego Garcia is released from custody and joins his family.

Abrego Garcia remains in the US

Over the next six years, Abrego Garcia becomes a full-time sheet metal apprentice and takes classes at the University of Maryland to get his journeyman license. As a condition of his withholding of removal status, he is required to check in with ICE once a year. His lawyers say he has been fully compliant.

Abrego Garcia appears for his ICE check-in without incident.

Abrego Garcia finishes a shift at a job site in Baltimore and picks up his 5-year-old son from his grandmother’s house. He is pulled over by ICE officers in several vehicles. An officer erroneously tells Abrego Garcia that his status has changed. He is handcuffed and placed in an ICE vehicle.

Vasquez Sura is contacted by phone and told to come get the couple's son. She talks briefly with Abrego Garcia, who is “confused and distraught,” according to court filings. In a phone call later that night, Abrego Garcia tells her he has been questioned about gang affiliations, which he has denied. He tells her he has been told he’ll appear before an immigration judge and be released.

Abrego Garcia phones Vasquez Sura and tells her he thinks he’s in Louisiana but is not sure. He says he’s still being told he’ll see a judge and be released.

In what proves to be their last phone call, Abrego Garcia tells Vasquez Sura he’s being deported to the Terrorism Confinement Center prison, known as CECOT, in El Salvador. He asks her to contact his family.

Abrego Garcia is among hundreds of suspected members of MS-13 and Venezuela’s Tren de Aragua crime gangs the government expels from the U.S. to El Salvador.

He is put on the third of three flights carrying hundreds of people from Harlingen, Texas, to El Salvador. The deportations come after Trump invokes the Alien Enemies Act of 1789, which lets a president jail or expel those from an enemy nation in wartime.

The administration said it sent two flights to El Salvador that day carrying deportees processed under the rarely used wartime statute and a third flight carrying people deported under other rules, Reuters reports.

The U.S. is paying $6 million to El Salvador to detain suspected gang members.

Vasquez Sura sees a photo in a news story about suspected Venezuelan gang members who were deported to CECOT without a hearing. She identifies Abrego Garcia in the photo, based on his distinctive tattoos and two scars on his head.

Abrego Garcia’s family files lawsuit against the government challenging his deportation.

In a court filing, Trump administration officials say Abrego Garcia was deported and imprisoned in El Salvador because of an “administrative error.” The administration says U.S. courts can’t have him returned because they don’t have jurisdiction in El Salvador.

“Through administrative error, Abrego Garcia was removed from the United States to El Salvador,” Robert Cerna, Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s acting field office director for enforcement and removal operations, said in a sworn statement. “This was an oversight, and the removal was carried out in good faith based on the existence of a final order of removal and Abrego Garcia’s purported membership in MS-13.”

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt tells reporters that despite the clerical error, Abrego Garcia is considered a ringleader of MS-13 and a suspected human trafficker.

In a rebuttal to a post on X, Vice President JD Vance says, “My comment is that according to the court document you apparently didn’t read he (Abrego Garcia) was a convicted MS-13 gang member with no legal right to be here.”

The lawsuit filed by Abrego Garcia's wife for his return says he is not a member of MS-13 or any other gang, USA TODAY reports. Abrego Garcia has never been charged or convicted of any crimes in El Salvador or the United States, the lawsuit says.

Judge Xinis orders the Trump administration to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S. by 11:59 p.m. Monday, April 7.

Justice Department lawyers immediately ask the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to pause the order. The appeals court says Abrego Garcia's lawyers must respond by Sunday afternoon.

A Justice Department lawyer who told Judge Xinis on April 4 that the administration made a mistake in deporting Abrego Garcia is put on indefinite leave.

Xinis issues a 22-page opinion that criticizes the administration for deporting Abrego Garcia and failing to return him to the U.S.

After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit declines to block the return order, the Justice Department appeals to the Supreme Court on April 7.

Chief Justice John Roberts issues an administrative stay that temporarily blocks Abrego Garcia's return and gives the court more time to review the case.

The Supreme Court on Thursday told the Trump administration to "facilitate" the return to the U.S. of Abrego Garcia.

The Supreme Court's unsigned four-page order did not directly require the administration to return Abrego Garcia. Instead, it sent the case back to Xinis, who last week ordered Abrego Garcia's return, and told her to clarify her order.

The court agreed with the part of Xinis's ruling that ordered the administration to “facilitate and effectuate the return” of Abrego Garcia. But it also expressed concern that the term "effectuate" in her order might be overreach in telling Trump officials how to manage foreign affairs.

"The District Court should clarify its directive, with due regard for the deference owed to the Executive Branch in the conduct of foreign affairs," the court said in its order. "For its part, the Government should be prepared to share what it can concerning the steps it has taken and the prospect of further steps."

Attorneys for the Trump administration tell Xinis that they don't have information on Abrego Garcia's location and condition and say the judge has not given the government enough time to formulate a plan for his return. Xinis orders daily updates on Abrego Garcia and sets another hearing for April 16.

The Trump administration says it's not required to ask El Salvador to return Abrego Garcia. The Supreme Court's April 10 ruling only mandates that the U.S. allow Abrego Garcia back into the country if El Salvador releases him, administration officials said in court filings.

In a meeting with Trump at the White House, El Salvador's president says Abrego Garcia will not be released.

"How can I return him to the United States? I smuggle him into the United States? Of course I'm not going to do it. The question is preposterous," Bukele says. "I don't have the power to return him to the United States. We're not very fond of releasing terrorists into our country.

"To liberate 350 million people, you have to imprison some. That's the way it works,” Bukele tells Trump.

Xinis says the Trump administration has ignored court orders and done nothing to free Abrego Garcia. She plans to order sworn testimony by officials to determine what has been done.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland, flies to El Salvador with the intent of visiting Abrego Garcia in CECOT prison. Two other Democrats, Rep. Maxwell Frost of Florida, and Rep. Yassamin Ansari of Arizona, say they are willing to travel to El Salvador.

The senator is prevented from visiting the prison, though at least two Republican House members were given a tour of the facility two days earlier.

Other Democrats, including Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, are also planning trips. Two House Democrats are seeking permission for an official Congressional delegation to visit the prison in which Abrego Garcia is confined.

An armed military checkpoint turns away Van Hollen during his second attempt to visit the prison. Officials later relent and bring Abrego Garcia to Van Hollen's hotel for a meeting there.

Also on Thursday, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously rejects a Justice Department effort to slow the process of “facilitating” Abrego Garcia's return.

“The government is asserting a right to stash away residents of this country in foreign prisons without the semblance of due process that is foundational to our constitutional order," the judges write in their decision. "Further, it claims in essence that because it has rid itself of custody that there is nothing that can be done. This should be shocking not only to judges, but to the intuitive sense of liberty that Americans far removed from courthouses still hold dear."

Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland, meets with Abrego Garcia in El Salvador. The senator tells reporters that Abrego Garcia told him he was traumatized by the experience and had been moved from the CECOT prison nine days earlier to another facility with better conditions.

Government attorneys had said as recently as April 12 that he was still at CECOT. But, according to Abrego Garcia's account, he had already been moved to the facility in Santa Ana, El Salvador, USA TODAY reported.

“He said he felt very sad about being in a prison because he had not committed any crimes,” said Van Hollen, who provided details of the meeting at a news conference after arriving back at Dulles International Airport near Washington.

Abrego Garcia returned to the U.S. to face criminal charges, USA TODAY and other sources report.

A federal grand jury handed down the indictment against Abrego Garcia on May 21 in Nashville, according to court records. The indictment was sealed until government lawyers filed to open it on June 6.

"From in or around 2016 through in or around 2025, Kilmar Armando Abrego Garica and others known and unknown to the Grand Jury, conspired to bring undocumented aliens to the United States from countries such as Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Ecuador, and elsewhere," the indictment reads.

If convicted, Abrego Garcia would face 10 years in U.S. prison and a $250,000 fine.

CONTRIBUTING Bart Jansen, Eduardo Ceuvas, Michael Collins, Nick Penzenstadler, Gabrielle Banks, Cybele Mayes-Osterman, Aysha Bagchi and Rebecca Morin

SOURCE USA TODAY Network reporting and research; Reuters; American Immigration Council

This story has been updated to include additional information.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Timeline: Abrego Garcia, deported in error, is back in US facing human trafficking charges

Reporting by George Petras and Veronica Bravo, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect