Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s lawyers say he wants to seek asylum in the United States

By MICHAEL KUNZELMAN and BEN FINLEY,  WASHINGTON (AP):- Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who has become the face of President Donald Trump ’s hard-line immigration agenda, wants to seek asylum in the United States, his lawyers told a federal judge Wednesday.

Abrego Garcia, 30, was detained Monday in Baltimore by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement after leaving a Tennessee jail on Friday. The Trump administration said it intends to deport him to the African country of Uganda.

Administration officials have said he’s part of the dangerous MS-13 gang, an allegation Abrego Garcia denies.

The Salvadoran national’s lawyers are fighting the deportation efforts in court, arguing he has the right to express fear of persecution and torture in Uganda. Abrego Garcia has also told immigration authorities he would prefer to be sent to Costa Rica if he must be removed from the U.S.

He had been denied asylum in 2019 by a U.S. immigration judge because he applied for asylum more than a year after he fled to the U.S. He left El Salvador at the age of 16 around 2011 to Maryland to join his brother, who had become a U.S. citizen.

Although the immigration judge denied asylum for Abrego Garcia, the judge did issue an order shielding Abrego Garcia from deportation to El Salvador. That’s because he faced credible threats of violence from a local gang there that had terrorized him and his family.

Abrego Garcia was granted a form of protection known as “withholding of removal,” which prohibits removal to his native El Salvador but allows deportation to another country.

Following the immigration judge’s ruling, Abrego Garcia was released under federal supervision in 2019 and continued to live with his American wife and children in Maryland. But in March, the Trump administration deported him to a notorious El Salvador prison.

The deportation violated the immigration judge’s 2019 order barring his deportation to El Salvador. Abrego Garcia’s wife sued to bring him back. Facing mounting pressure and a U.S. Supreme Court order, the Trump administration returned Abrego Garcia to the U.S. in June, but only to face federal charges of human smuggling.

The Trump administration moved to deport Abrego Garcia again on Monday. He then stated his intent to reopen his immigration case in Maryland and to seek asylum again, his lawyers said Wednesday.

Asylum, as defined under U.S. law, includes a green card and path to citizenship. Abrego Garcia can still challenge his deportation to Uganda, or any other country, on grounds that it is unsafe.

Abrego Garcia’s lawyers say sending him to Uganda is punishment for successfully fighting his deportation to El Salvador, refusing to plead guilty to the smuggling charges and for seeking release from jail in Tennessee. Meanwhile in Uganda, critics claim that the country has made a murky deal with the Trump administration to accept deportees in exchange for easing political pressure on the country’s president, who has ruled for nearly four decades.

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Finley reported from Norfolk, Virginia. Associated Press writer Elliot Spagat contributed to this report.