Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a migrant at the center of a legal battle with the Trump administration, has seen his lawyers ramp up pressure on a Maryland judge to dismiss the government’s attempt to withhold information under the guise of national security. The legal team argues that the administration, including former President Donald Trump, has already publicly discussed the case extensively, thus negating any potential harm that could arise from disclosing further details.
The core of Abrego Garcia’s lawyers’ argument rests on the assertion that Trump and other high-ranking officials have openly opposed his return from a Salvadoran prison, despite multiple court orders mandating his return to the United States. They point to statements made in congressional testimony, media interviews, and social media posts as evidence of this opposition. These public pronouncements, they contend, contradict the government’s claim that disclosing information about the case would compromise national security.
The issue is set to come to a head on Friday, when a federal judge is scheduled to consider the next steps in this high-profile case. Abrego Garcia’s legal team has been pushing for discovery, a legal process that allows them to gather evidence and uncover the full extent of the government’s efforts, or lack thereof, to facilitate their client’s return. They argue that this information is essential to determining whether the government is complying with court orders.
In a filing to U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, who initially ordered Abrego Garcia’s return, the lawyers accused the government of "stonewalling" their efforts by asserting unsupported privileges, primarily state secrets and deliberative process. They allege that the government has used these privileges to withhold written discovery and instruct witnesses not to answer even basic questions during depositions.
"Even as the Government speaks freely about Abrego Garcia in public, in this litigation it insists on secrecy," the lawyers stated, highlighting the perceived hypocrisy of the administration’s position.
The legal battle has been ongoing for months, with the Supreme Court previously ordering the Trump administration to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return to the U.S., upholding the orders of the lower court judge. However, since that ruling, the government and Abrego Garcia’s attorneys have been engaged in a dispute over the precise meaning of "facilitate."
Trump administration officials have maintained that Abrego Garcia is a member of the MS-13 gang, although no formal ties have been definitively proven. This allegation has further complicated the case, with the government seemingly using it as justification for its reluctance to comply with the court orders.
Judge Xinis has ordered expedited discovery to determine whether the administration is complying with her directive to return Abrego Garcia to the U.S. She has also ordered the Trump administration to submit a previously requested privilege log related to its invocation of the state secrets privilege. The judge set a deadline for compliance and warned that failure to file the log or otherwise respond would be considered an "intentional refusal" to follow the court’s orders.
The state secrets privilege is a legal tool that allows the government to withhold certain information from the courts if it can prove a "reasonable danger" to national security and foreign affairs if the information is made public. However, Abrego Garcia’s lawyers argue that the administration’s assertion of this privilege is simply another attempt to obstruct their client’s return.
They point to public remarks made by various officials, including Attorney General Pam Bondi, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, and former President Donald Trump, indicating their opposition to Abrego Garcia’s return. These statements, they argue, undermine the government’s claims that disclosing information about the case would compromise national security.
"Over and over again, official statements by the Government – in congressional testimony, television interviews, and social media – confirm that producing this information would not imperil national security," Abrego Garcia’s lawyers told Judge Xinis. They urged her to scrutinize the administration’s decision to invoke state secrets privilege with a "careful and skeptical" eye.
"On its face, there is little reason to believe that compliance with a court order to facilitate the release and return of a single mistakenly removed individual so that he can get his day in court implicates state secrets at all," they added.
The Trump administration, on the other hand, has argued that it has already provided Abrego Garcia’s attorneys with "robust" responses to discovery requests ordered by Judge Xinis. They claim that granting the new requests for additional information or supplemental documents "would not advance any legitimate end of expedited discovery."
This is not the first time the Trump administration has attempted to use state secrets privileges to shield against sharing certain information in court. In a separate case challenging early deportations under the Alien Enemies Act, the administration invoked the privilege after repeatedly refusing to provide the court details about deportation flights.
In that case, administration lawyers declined to disclose how many individuals were deported solely on the basis of the act, where the planes landed, what time they departed, and from which locations, citing national security concerns.
The use of state secrets privilege has drawn scrutiny, particularly when senior administration officials have made public statements about the same issues that the government claims are confidential. In a related case, a judge pressed Justice Department attorneys about public remarks made by Trump and Noem about CECOT, a maximum-security prison in El Salvador where the U.S. has deported hundreds of migrants.
The judge questioned DOJ lawyers about the White House’s role in securing prisoner releases, asking, "Is the president not telling the truth? Or could he secure his release?"
Abrego Garcia’s lawyers argue that there is little evidence to justify the Trump administration’s use of the privilege in their client’s case, noting that no military or intelligence operations are at issue. They assert that it "defies reason to imagine that the United States’ relationship with El Salvador would be endangered by any effort to seek the return of a wrongfully deported person who the Government admits never should have been removed to El Salvador in the first place."
The upcoming status conference scheduled for Friday afternoon in Greenbelt, Maryland, will provide an opportunity for Judge Xinis to hear arguments from both sides and determine the next course of action in this contentious legal battle. The outcome of the conference could have significant implications for Abrego Garcia’s future and the broader issue of government transparency in immigration cases.
