Rallygoers hold a sign that reads “Free Kilmar” during a rally Friday, Oct. 10, 2025, outside the U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, Maryland. (Photo by William J. Ford/Maryland Matters)

GREENBELT, Md. — A federal judge in Maryland seemed inclined to order the release of  Kilmar Abrego Garcia from immigration detention after oral arguments in court Friday, a potentially major development in the high-profile case.

After a more than six-hour hearing, District Judge Paula Xinis said a witness provided by the Justice Department showed little evidence that the Trump administration made an effort to remove Abrego Garcia to the southern African nation of Eswatini, and knew nothing about Abrego Garcia agreeing to be removed to Costa Rica. 

The witness tapped by the Department of Justice was John Schultz, a deputy assistant director who oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement removal operations.

After hearing from him, Xinis said keeping Abrego Garcia detained indefinitely would likely be unconstitutional. She said she would issue an order soon.

Abrego Garcia, the Salvadoran immigrant whose wrongful deportation from Maryland put a spotlight on the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration crackdown, is currently detained in Pennsylvania. 

His attorneys have argued the Trump administration is using detention to punish Abrego Garcia because officials are not trying to remove him, even after Abrego Garcia agreed to be deported to Costa Rica.

‘Three strikes, you’re out’

Xinis expressed her frustration with Department of Justice attorneys for not providing a witness who would give clear answers on how immigration officials were handling the removal of Abrego Garcia. 

“We’re getting to the three strikes, you’re out,” Xinis said. 

Andrew J. Rossman, an attorney for Abrego Garcia, argued that if Immigration and Customs Enforcement is making no plans to immediately remove him, he should be released from detention. 

He also argued that since March, when the Trump administration erroneously deported Abrego Garcia to a mega-prison in El Salvador, to the present, Abrego Garcia has been “in continuous containment” way past the six-month limit set by the Supreme Court regarding the detention of immigrants.

“The real aim of the government… is punitive, which is just to keep him incarcerated,” Rossman said. “It’s an overtly political purpose.”

Rossman told Xinis that he has not received an answer from the federal government as to why they will not remove Abrego Garcia to Costa Rica, after he agreed to that proposal in August.

Xinis asked DOJ attorney Drew Ensign why Abrego Garcia hasn’t been removed to Costa Rica.

Ensign said that it was not clear to the government until Friday that Abrego Garcia had agreed to be removed to Costa Rica, because Abrego Garcia had previously expressed fear of being sent there. 

Abrego Garcia changed his position after Costa Rica assured him he would be given refugee status.

“That is a new development that I will report back to people,” Ensign said.

Supreme Court ruling

A 2001 Supreme Court ruling does not allow for immigrants to be detained longer than six months if the federal government is making no efforts to remove them. 

After 90 days without efforts to deport an immigrant, a challenge can be made because detaining that person any longer than a maximum of 180 days, or six months, would likely be unconstitutional, the high court found in Zadvydas v. Davis. 

Earlier this week, Xinis seemed likely to order Abrego Garcia’s release from Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention, where he has remained since late August. 

Xinis, who also ordered the Trump administration to return Abrego Garica to the United States after she found his removal to El Salvador unlawful, is overseeing his habeas corpus petition, which challenges his detention.

Protesters rally outside the courthouse

Ahead of the hearing, dozens of supporters from the immigrant advocacy group CASA gathered in front of the District Court for the District of Maryland, chanting, “Somos todos Kilmar,” or, “We are all Kilmar.” 

Rallygoers also chanted “What do we want? Justice!” “When do we want it? Now!” 

Some also held signs urging the Trump administration to free Abrego Garcia.

Two Maryland state legislators, Dels. Nicole Williams and Bernice Mireku-North, both Democrats, joined the rally.

Williams sponsored legislation during this year’s General Assembly session to prohibit local police from entering into certain agreements with ICE. On the last day of the legislative session in April, lawmakers passed a watered-down version of a bill that does not include the ban, the biggest loss for Maryland immigration advocates this year.

“We are going to be working on legislation with regards to masking by law enforcement officers,” Williams said. “We need to start treating everyone, I don’t care where you’re from, in a humane and decent way. And that’s what we’re going to be fighting for every single day until Kilmar is free and Kilmar comes home. So stop using Kilmar for your own political gain. Bring Kilmar home.”

White House involvement

Schultz, the DOJ witness, revealed that the White House had direct involvement in picking Uganda as a potential third country of removal for ICE’s deportation of Abrego Garcia. 

The move was unusual because the State Department typically coordinates third-country removals for the Department of Homeland Security.

Schultz said the Homeland Security Council, which operates within the White House, notified ICE of Uganda as a third country of removal. The Homeland Security Council works with the National Security Council of the White House. 

While Uganda is no longer a third country of removal for Abrego Garcia, ICE is trying to now remove him to Eswatini. 

Schultz said Eswatini has not agreed to take Abrego Garcia, but discussions, which he said started on Wednesday, are underway. 

“The discussions are continuing,” Schultz said. 

Schultz said he is not aware if ICE has not made any efforts to determine if Abrego Garcia would face persecution or be tortured or confined in Eswatini, or be removed a second time to El Salvador.  

Eswatini has previously agreed to accept third-country removals from the U.S. and the two countries have a memorandum of understanding, he added.

Ghana another potential destination

Schultz said that ICE has also identified the west African country of Ghana as a potential nation for Abrego Garica’s removal. Schultz said once a third country has agreed to accept Abrego Garica, he could be removed by ICE within 72 hours.

However, Ghana’s Foreign Minister, Sam Okudzeto Ablakwa, wrote on social media that the country will not accept Abrego Garcia. 

“This has been directly and unambiguously conveyed to US authorities,” he wrote. “In my interactions with US officials, I made clear that our understanding to accept a limited number of non-criminal West Africans, purely on the grounds of African solidarity and humanitarian principles would not be expanded.”

Schultz said that ICE “prematurely” sent a notice of removal to Abrego Garcia with Ghana as the designation.

The Costa Rica alternative

One of Abrego Garcia’s attorneys, Sascha Rand, grilled Schultz about why DHS would not remove him to Costa Rica, despite Abrego Garcia agreeing to go.

Schultz said he was unaware of the letter from Costa Rica’s government saying it would accept Abrego Garcia.

Another attorney for Abrego Garcia, Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, said that the Trump administration offered to remove Abrego Garcia to Costa Rica in August if he were to plead guilty to criminal charges in a federal case in Tennessee. 

Abrego Garcia’s attorneys in his criminal case in Nashville said in court filings that the Trump administration is trying to get him to plead guilty to human smuggling charges by promising to remove him to Costa Rica if he does so, and threatening to deport him to Uganda if he refuses. 

Rand asked Schultz if anyone from DHS was in contact with Costa Rica.

Schultz said he was unaware if there were conversations between the federal government and Costa Rica about removing him there. 

Rossman said based on Schultz’s testimony, it was clear the Trump administration was “holding hostage passage to Costa Rica.”

“They aren’t presently intending to remove him,” he said. “They have spun the globe and picked various (African) countries… to fail on purpose.”

William J. Ford of Maryland Matters contributed to this report.

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Oct. 7, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi aimed heated rhetoric at Democratic senators on Capitol Hill Tuesday as she faced questions over the administration’s surge of federal agents to blue cities, as well as a litany of controversial issues surrounding the Department of Justice. 

In one fervid exchange during the routine oversight hearing before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Bondi lashed out at Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, “I wish you’d love Chicago as much as you hate President Trump.”

“And currently the National Guard are on the way to Chicago — if you’re not going to protect your citizens, President Trump will,” Bondi continued, responding to a question from Durbin on whether she had any conversations with the administration ahead of a deployment of the National Guard to Chicago.

“And by the way so is (FBI) Director Kash Patel and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. You’re sitting here grilling me, and they’re on their way to Chicago to keep your state safe,” Bondi said.

“Madam Attorney General, it’s my job to grill you,” Durbin responded.

Battles with states

Bondi’s hearing occurred after a whirlwind weekend of back-and-forth between a federal judge and the Trump administration over whether National Guard troops could be sent to Portland, Oregon, and were necessary to protect federal law enforcement engaged with Immigration and Custom Enforcement protesters.

Illinois is now locked in a legal battle to block troops from coming to Chicago.

Chicago is a month into a federal crackdown. One of the most high-profile raids occurred in the city’s South Shore neighborhood on Sept. 30 when dozens of federal agents, including from the FBI, overran a five-story apartment building with helicopters and flashbangs, ziptying adults and children, and detaining some U.S. citizens, according to multiple media reports. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security published a highly produced video of the raid on social media.

Bondi’s voice grew hoarse during the hearing as she defended the administration’s campaign to arrest “countless” immigrants she described as “illegal aliens.”

The attorney general was combative with Democratic senators throughout nearly five hours of questioning — telling Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, “Don’t you ever challenge my integrity” when he asked about DOJ’s recently dismissed antitrust lawsuit against American Express. 

Bondi later accused Sen. Mazie Hirono of supporting the loose political ideology antifa — which the White House is targeting as a cohesive body — when the Hawaii Democrat questioned a range of issues, including the department’s alleged consideration of a compensation fund for pardoned Jan. 6 rioters.

Tom Homan troubles aired

A laundry list of controversial incidents trailed Bondi into the committee room for the oversight hearing — including revelations of FBI agents handing $50,000 in a restaurant takeout bag to Tom Homan, Trump ally and now White House border czar, ahead of the November 2024 election in exchange for false government contracts.

Bondi declined to answer Democratic Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse when he asked, “What became of the $50,000 in cash that the FBI delivered evidently in a paper bag to Mr. Homan?” 

Whitehouse, of Rhode Island, and other Democratic senators asked if Homan kept the money and if he claimed it on his income tax return.

“The investigation of Mr. Homan was subjected to a full review by the FBI and the DOJ. They found no credible evidence of wrongdoing,” Bondi said.

She then accused Whitehouse of corruption and accepting “dark money.”

“The questions here are actually pretty specific, so having you respond with completely irrelevant far-right internet talking points is really not very helpful,” Whitehouse said.

Comey indictment directed by Trump

Lawmakers from both parties volleyed accusations of the department’s “weaponization” against the previous and current administrations. 

Bondi’s appearance came less than two weeks after a grand jury returned an indictment of former Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey. The indictment swiftly followed the administration’s ouster of interim U.S. Attorney Erik Seibert in Virginia after he resisted bringing charges against Comey and New York Democratic Attorney General Letitia James. The administration replaced Seibert with President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer, Lindsey Halligan. 

Days before the Comey indictment, Trump directly appealed to Bondi as “Pam” on his social media platform Truth Social: “What about Comey, Adam ‘Shifty’ Schiff, Leticia??? They’re all guilty as hell, but nothing is going to be done.”

Schiff, a California Democrat, sits on the Judiciary Committee. Late in the hearing, Bondi suggested Schiff should “apologize” to Trump for his past efforts in impeachment proceedings during the president’s first term. Bondi also attacked Schiff as a “failed lawyer.”

Grassley Jan. 6 disclosure

Republicans seethed during the hearing at Monday’s disclosure by Committee Chair Chuck Grassley that FBI agents analyzed data on more than half a dozen Republican lawmakers’ phones during their 2023 investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.

The FBI allegedly sought data from the days surrounding the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol attack from the phones of Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Bill Hagerty of Tennessee, Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, as well as Rep. Mike Kelly of Pennsylvania. 

Hawley likened the investigation of his colleagues’ phones to a “witch hunt” and called for a special prosecutor to “get to the bottom of” alleged Department of Justice activities under former President Joe Biden.

“I find this breathtaking,” said Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana.

At Kennedy’s urging, Grassley of Iowa said his staff is conducting an investigation of the possible collection of phone data and that he may schedule a separate hearing on the matter.

Trump responded to the disclosure Tuesday morning on Truth Social: “Deranged Jack Smith got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. A real sleazebag!!!” 

Bondi also faced scrutiny from Democratic senators who rehashed her promises to release information on the federal probe of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, only to be followed by an FBI memo denying the release of any further case files.

A bipartisan effort is underway in the U.S. House to compel the release of the government’s investigative materials.