Chief Justice pauses deadline for return of deported Maryland man

Chief Justice John Roberts agreed on Monday, April 7, 2025, to pause a midnight deadline for the Trump administration to return a Maryland man mistakenly deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador.

The temporary order comes hours after a Justice Department emergency appeal to the Supreme Court.

The appeal arguing U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis overstepped her authority when she ordered Kilmar Abrego Garcia returned to the United States.

The administration has conceded that Abrego Garcia should not have been sent to El Salvador because an immigration judge found he likely would face persecution by local gangs.

The administration argued that he is no longer in U.S. custody and the government has no way to get him back.

Xinis gave the administration until just before midnight to “facilitate and effectuate” Abrego Garcia’s return.

Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in court papers:

“The district court’s injunction, which requires Abrego Garcia’s release from the custody of a foreign sovereign and return to the United States by midnight on Monday, is patently unlawful,”

He casted the order as one in “a deluge of unlawful injunctions” judges have issued to slow President Donald Trump’s agenda.

The Justice Department appeal was directed to Roberts because he handles appeals from Maryland.

The Trump administration is separately asking the Supreme Court to allow Trump to resume deportations of Venezuelan migrants accused of being gang members to the same Salvadoran prison under an 18th century wartime law.

The federal appeals court in Richmond, Virginia, denied the administration’s request for a stay.

Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson wrote in a brief opinion accompanying the unanimous denial:

“There is no question that the government screwed up here.”

The White House has described Abrego Garcia’s deportation as an “administrative error” but has also cast him an MS-13 gang member.

Attorneys for Abrego Garcia said there is no evidence he was in MS-13.

Abrego Garcia’s lawyers wrote in a response filed moments after Roberts issued his temporary pause:

“The Executive branch may not seize individuals from the streets, deposit them in foreign prisons in violation of court orders, and then invoke the separation of powers to insulate its unlawful actions from judicial scrutiny,”

Xinis wrote that the decision to arrest him and send him to El Salvador appears to be “wholly lawless.”

He explained that little to no evidence supports a “vague, uncorroborated” allegation that Abrego Garcia was once an MS-13 member.

Abrego Garcia, a 29-year-old Salvadoran national who has never been charged or convicted of any crime, was detained by immigration agents and deported last month.

He had a permit from DHS to legally work in the U.S. and was a sheet metal apprentice pursuing a journeyman license, his attorney said. His wife is a U.S. citizen.

In 2019, an immigration judge barred the U.S. from deporting Abrego Garcia to El Salvador.

A Justice Department lawyer conceded in a court hearing that Abrego Garcia should not have been deported. Attorney General Pam Bondi later removed the lawyer, Erez Reuveni, from the case and placed him on leave.

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