Kilmar Abrego Garcia seeking asylum in U.S., attorneys say

Kilmar Abrego Garcia's lawyers said Wednesday in federal court that he is seeking asylum in the U.S. as he faces deportation to Uganda.

Abrego Garcia, 30, was detained Monday by U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement agents in Baltimore after leaving a Tennessee jail on Friday, The Associated Press reported. The Trump administration has alleged that Abrego Garcia is part of the MS-13 gang, which he has denied.

He is a Salvadoran national, and his lawyers have argued that he has the right to express fear of persecution and torture in Uganda. Abrego Garcia has also told immigration officials that he would prefer to be sent to Costa Rica if he must be deported.

Immigration officials had said they plan to deport him to Uganda, which recently agreed to accept certain deportees, after Abrego Garcia declined an offer to be removed to Costa Rica in exchange for pleading guilty to human smuggling charges.

The Costa Rican government said that Abrego Garcia would be welcomed as a legal immigrant and wouldn’t face detention, according to federal court filings.

According to Abrego Garcia's lawyers, the federal government had given him until Monday to accept the plea deal and deportation to Costa Rica, or “that offer will be off the table forever.”

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

The Trump administration on Monday moved to deport Abrego Garcia. The Salvadoran national said he intended to reopen his immigration case in Maryland and to seek asylum again, according to his lawyers on Wednesday.

His attorneys argue that sending him to Uganda is punishment for successfully fighting his deportation to El Salvador, refusing to plead guilty to the smuggling charges, and seeking release from jail in Tennessee.