(NEW YORK) — A federal judge has ordered the immediate release of Kilmar Abrego Garcia from immigration detention.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said in her order Thursday that “since Abrego Garcia’s wrongful detention in El Salvador, he has been re-detained, again without lawful authority.”

Xinis said that the absence of a removal order prevents the government from removing Abrego Garcia from the United States.

Abrego Garcia, a Salvadoran native who had been living in Maryland with his wife and children, was deported in March to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison — despite a 2019 court order barring his deportation to that country due to fear of persecution — after the Trump administration claimed he was a member of the criminal gang MS-13, which he denies.

He was brought back to the U

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