A newly unsealed order in the criminal case against Kilmar Abrego Garcia reveals that high-level Justice Department officials pushed for his indictment, calling it a “top priority,” only after he was mistakenly deported and then ordered returned to the U.S.

Abrego Garcia has pleaded not guilty in federal court in Tennessee to charges of human smuggling. He is seeking to have the case dismissed on the grounds that the prosecution is vindictive — a way for President Donald Trump’s administration to punish him for the embarrassment of his mistaken deportation.

To support that argument, he has asked the government to turn over documents that reveal how the decision was made to prosecute him in 2025 for an incident that occurred in 2022. On Dec. 3, U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw filed an order under seal that compelled the government to provide some documents to Abrego Garcia and his attorneys. That order was unsealed on Tuesday and sheds new light on the case.

Earlier, Crenshaw found that there was “some evidence” that the prosecution of Abrego Garcia could be vindictive. He specifically cited a statement by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche on a Fox News program that seemed to suggest that the Department of Justice charged Abrego Garcia because he had won his wrongful deportation case.

Rob McGuire, who was the Acting U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee until late December, argued that those statements were irrelevant because he alone made the decision to prosecute, and he has no animus against Abrego Garcia.

In the newly unsealed order, Crenshaw writes, “Some of the documents suggest not only that McGuire was not a solitary decision-maker, but he in fact reported to others in DOJ and the decision to prosecute Abrego may have been a joint decision.”

DOJ officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The human smuggling charges stem from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee where Abrego Garcia was pulled over for speeding. There were nine passengers in the car, and state troopers discussed the possibility of human smuggling among themselves. However, he was ultimately allowed to leave with only a warning. The case was turned over to Homeland Security Investigations, but there is no record of any effort to charge him until April 2025, according to court records.

The order does not give a lot of detail on what is in the documents that were turned over to Abrego Garcia, but it shows that Aakash Singh, who works under Blanche in the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, contacted McGuire about Abrego Garcia’s case on April 27, the same day that McGuire received a file on the case from Homeland Security Investigations. That was several days after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Abrego Garcia’s favor on April 10.

On April 30, Singh said in an email to McGuire that the prosecution was a “top priority” for the Deputy Attorney General’s Office, according to the order. Singh and McGuire continued to communicate about the prosecution. On May 15, McGuire emailed his staff that Blanche “would like Garcia charged sooner rather than later,” Crenshaw writes.

On May 18, Singh wrote to McGuire and others to hold the draft indictment until they got “clearance” to file it. “The implication is that ‘clearance’ would come from the Office of the Deputy Attorney General,” Crenshaw writes.

A hearing on the motion to dismiss the case on the basis of vindictive prosecution is scheduled for Jan. 28.

The U.S. government plans to deport Kilmar Abrego Garcia to Liberia, and could do so as early as Octobrt 31, according to a Friday (October 24, 2025) court filing.

The Salvadoran national’s case has become a magnet for opposition to President Donald Trump’s immigration policies since he was mistakenly deported to El Salvador, in violation of a settlement agreement. He was returned to the U.S. in June after the U.S. Supreme Court said the administration had to work to bring him back. Since he cannot be re-deported to El Salvador, ICE has been seeking to deport him to a series of African countries.

Meanwhile, a federal judge in Maryland has previously barred his immediate deportation. Abrego Garcia’s lawsuit there claims the Trump administration is illegally using the deportation process to punish him for the embarrassment of his earlier mistaken deportation.

A Friday (October 24) court filing from the Department of Homeland Security notes that “Liberia is a thriving democracy and one of the United States’s closest partners on the African continent.” Its national language is English; its constitution “provides robust protections for human rights;” and Liberia is “committed to the humane treatment of refugees,” the filing reads. It concludes that Abrego Garcia could be deported as soon as October 31.

“After failed attempts with Uganda, Eswatini, and Ghana, ICE now seeks to deport our client, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, to Liberia, a country with which he has no connection, thousands of miles from his family and home in Maryland,” a statement from attorney Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg reads. “Costa Rica stands ready to accept him as a refugee, a viable and lawful option. Yet the government has chosen a course calculated to inflict maximum hardship. These actions are punitive, cruel, and unconstitutional.”

Mr. Abrego Garcia has an American wife and child and lived in Maryland for years, but he immigrated to the US illegally as a teenager. In 2019, an immigration judge granted him protection from being deported back to El Salvador, where he faces a “well-founded fear” of violence from a gang that targeted his family, according to court filings. In a separate action in immigration court, Mr. Abrego Garcia has applied for asylum in the United States.

Additionally, Mr.. Abrego Garcia is facing criminal charges in federal court in Tennessee, where he has pleaded not guilty to human smuggling. He has filed a motion to dismiss the charges, claiming the prosecution is vindictive.