Who is Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the man ICE mistakenly deported to an El Salvador prison?

Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s story begins in his native El Salvador, but it's become increasingly unclear where it will end.

The U.S. Supreme Court has ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return to the U.S. from a notorious Salvadoran prison, rejecting the White House's claim that it couldn't retrieve Abrego Garcia after mistakenly deporting him.

Trump administration officials have pushed back against bringing him back, arguing it is up to El Salvador. The president of El Salvador said he lacked the power to return Abrego Garcia, saying it would be “preposterous" to “smuggle a terrorist into the United States.”

Abrego Garcia, 29, lived in the U.S. for roughly 14 years, during which he worked construction, got married and was raising three children with disabilities, according to court records.

Trump administration officials said he was deported based on a 2019 accusation from Maryland police he was an MS-13 gang member. Abrego Garcia denied the allegation and was never charged with a crime, his attorneys said.

A U.S. immigration judge subsequently shielded Abrego Garcia from deportation to El Salvador because he likely faced persecution there by local gangs. The Trump administration deported him there last month anyway, later describing the mistake as “an administrative error” but insisting he was in MS-13.

As his case continues in the U.S. courts, here is Abrego Garcia's story so far:

Abrego Garcia grew up in El Salvador’s capital city, San Salvador, according to court documents filed in U.S. immigration court in 2019. His father was a former police officer. His mother, Cecilia, sold pupusas, the nation’s signature dish of flat tortilla pouches that hold steaming blends of cheese, beans or pork.

The entire family, including his two sisters and brother, ran the business from home, court records state. Abrego Garcia’s job was buying ingredients and making deliveries with his older brother, Cesar.

“Everyone in the town knew to get their pupusas from ‘Pupuseria Cecilia,’” his lawyers wrote.

A local gang, Barrio 18, began extorting the family for “rent money” and threatened to kill Cesar — or force him into their gang — if they weren’t paid, court documents state. The family complied but eventually sent Cesar to the U.S.

Barrio 18 similarly targeted Abrego Garcia, according to his immigration case. When he was 12, the gang threatened to take him away until his father paid “all of the money that they wanted.” They still watched him as he walked to and from school.

The family moved 10 minutes away, but the gang threatened to rape and kill Abrego Garcia’s sisters, court records state. The family closed the business, moved again, and eventually sent Abrego Garcia to the U.S.

The family never went to the authorities because of rampant police corruption, according to court filings. The gang continued to harass the family in Guatemala, which borders El Salvador.

Abrego Garcia fled to the U.S. illegally around 2011, the year he turned 16, according to documents in his immigration case. He joined Cesar, now a U.S. citizen, in Maryland and found work in construction.

About five years later, Abrego Garcia met Jennifer Vasquez Sura, a U.S. citizen, the records say. In 2018, after she learned she was pregnant, he moved in with her and her two children. They lived in Prince George’s County, outside Washington.

In March 2019, Abrego Garcia went to a Home Depot seeking work as a laborer when he and three other men were detained by local police, court records say. They were suspected of being in MS-13 based on tattoos and clothing, according to the records.

Local police contacted a criminal informant who said Abrego Garcia was in MS-13, the interview sheet stated.

Now, attorneys for Abrego Garcia say the informant had identified an MS-13 chapter in New York, where Abrego Garcia has never lived.

Prince George's County Police did not charge the men and had no further interactions with Abrego Garcia or “any new intelligence" on him, the department said in a recent statement.

Local police turned Abrego Garcia over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to his immigration case. He told a U.S. immigration judge that he would seek asylum and asked to be released. Vasquez Sura was five months into a high-risk pregnancy, case documents say.

The Department of Homeland Security alleged Abrego Garcia was a gang member based on the county police's information, according to his immigration case. The information was enough for an immigration judge in April 2019 to keep Abrego Garcia in jail as his case continued, the records show. The judge said the informant was proven and reliable and had verified his gang membership.

Abrego Garcia appealed the judge's decision to keep him in jail, but that was later denied, records show.

Abrego Garcia later married Vasquez Sura in a Maryland detention center, according to court filings. She gave birth while he was still in jail.

In October 2019, an immigration judge denied Abrego Garcia’s asylum request but granted him protection from being deported back to El Salvador because of a “well-founded fear” of gang persecution, according to his case. He was released; ICE did not appeal.

Abrego Garcia checked in with ICE yearly while Homeland Security issued him a work permit, his attorneys said in court filings. He joined a union and was employed full time as a sheet metal apprentice.

In 2021, Vasquez Sura filed a temporary protection order against Abrego Garcia, stating he punched, scratched and ripped off her shirt during an argument. The case was dismissed weeks later, according to court records.

Vasquez Sura said in a statement, after the document's release by the Trump administration, that the couple had worked things out “privately as a family, including by going to counseling.”

“After surviving domestic violence in a previous relationship, I acted out of caution after a disagreement with Kilmar,” she stated. “Things did not escalate, and I decided not to follow through with the civil court process.”

She said the protection order doesn't justify his deportation.

“Kilmar has always been a loving partner and father, and I will continue to stand by him,” she said.

In 2022, according to a report released by the Trump administration, Abrego Garcia was stopped by the Tennessee Highway Patrol for speeding. The vehicle had eight other people and no luggage, prompting an officer to suspect human trafficking, the report stated.

Abrego Garcia said he was driving them from Texas to Maryland for construction work, the report stated. No citations were issued.

Abrego Garcia's wife said in a statement that he sometimes transported groups of workers between job sites, “so it’s entirely plausible he would have been pulled over while driving with others in the vehicle. He was not charged with any crime or cited for any wrongdoing.”

Abrego Garcia and Vasquez Sura were raising three kids, including their 5-year-old son, who has autism, is deaf in one ear and unable to verbally communicate, according to the complaint against the Trump administration. They were also raising a 9-year-old with autism and a 10-year-old with epilepsy.

In February, the Trump administration designated MS-13 as a foreign terrorist organization and sought to remove identified members “as expeditiously as possible,” U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in a brief to the Supreme Court.

Abrego Garcia was pulled over March 12 outside an Ikea in Baltimore with his son, according to court records. An agent called Vasquez Sura and said she had 10 minutes to retrieve their son or ICE would request child protective services.

Abrego Garcia called his wife from jail and said authorities pressed him about MS-13, according to court documents. They asked about a photo they had of him playing basketball on a public court, and his family’s visits to a restaurant serving Mexican and Salvadoran food.

“He would repeat the truth again and again — that he was not in a gang,” Vasquez Sura stated in court documents.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., accompanied by Cesar Abrego Garcia, from left, and Cecilia Garcia, speaks during a news conference upon his arrival from meeting with Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador, at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., Friday, April 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., left, walks in the terminal after speaking during a news conference upon his arrival from meeting with Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador, at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., Friday, April 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Jennifer Vasquez Sura cries as Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., speaks during a news conference upon his arrival from meeting with her husband Kilmar Abrego Garcia in El Salvador, at Washington Dulles International Airport, in Chantilly, Va., Friday, April 18, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Jennifer Vasquez Sura, the wife of Kilmar Abrego Garcia of Maryland, who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador, right, stands with supporters during a news conference at CASA's Multicultural Center in Hyattsville, Md., Friday, April 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Jennifer Vasquez Sura, the wife of Kilmar Abrego Garcia of Maryland, who was mistakenly deported to El Salvador, speaks during a news conference at CASA's Multicultural Center in Hyattsville, Md., Friday, April 4, 2025. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

A federal judge on Thursday barred the Trump administration from deporting any Venezuelans from South Texas under an 18th-century wartime law and said President Donald Trump's invocation of it was “unlawful.”

U.S. District Court Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr. is the first judge to rule that the Alien Enemies Act cannot be used against people who, the Republican administration claims, are gang members invading the United States. Rodriguez said he wouldn't interfere with the government's right to deport people in the country illegally through other means, but it could not rely on the 227-year-old law to do so.

“Neither the Court nor the parties question that the Executive Branch can direct the detention and removal of aliens who engage in criminal activity in the United States,” wrote Rodriguez, who was nominated by Trump in 2018. But, the judge said, "the President’s invocation of the AEA through the Proclamation exceeds the scope of the statute and is contrary to the plain, ordinary meaning of the statute’s terms.”

In March, Trump issued a proclamation claiming that the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua was invading the U.S. He said he had special powers to deport immigrants, identified by his administration as gang members, without the usual court proceedings.

"The Court concludes that the President’s invocation of the AEA through the Proclamation exceeds the scope of the statute and, as a result, is unlawful,” Rodriguez wrote.

In an interview on Fox News, Vice President JD Vance said the administration will be “aggressively appealing” the ruling and others that hem in the president's deportation power.

“The judge doesn’t make that determination, whether the Alien Enemies Act can be deployed,” Vance said. “I think the president of the United States is the one who determines whether this country is being invaded.”

The chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Rep. Adriano Espaillat, D-N.Y., said in a statement the judge had made clear “what we all knew to be true: The Trump administration illegally used the Alien Enemies Act to deport people without due process.”

The Alien Enemies Act has only been used three times before in U.S. history, most recently during World War II, when it was cited to intern Japanese-Americans.

The proclamation triggered a flurry of litigation as the administration tried to ship migrants it claimed were gang members to a notorious prison in El Salvador.

Rodriguez’s ruling is significant because it is the first formal permanent injunction against the administration using the AEA and contends the president is misusing the law. "Congress never meant for this law to be used in this manner,” said Lee Gelernt, the ACLU lawyer who argued the case, in response to the ruling.

Rodriguez agreed, noting that the provision has only been used during the two World Wars and the War of 1812. Trump claimed Tren de Aragua was acting at the behest of the Venezuelan government, but Rodriguez found that the activities the administration accused it of did not amount to an invasion or “predatory incursion,” as the statute requires.

“The Proclamation makes no reference to and in no manner suggests that a threat exists of an organized, armed group of individuals entering the United States at the direction of Venezuela to conquer the country or assume control over a portion of the nation,” Rodriguez wrote. “Thus, the Proclamation’s language cannot be read as describing conduct that falls within the meaning of ‘invasion’ for purposes of the AEA.”

If the administration appeals, it would go first to the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. That is among the nation’s most conservative appeals courts and it also has ruled against what it saw as overreach on immigration matters by both the Obama and Biden administrations. In those cases, Democratic administrations had sought to make it easier for immigrants to remain in the U.S.

The administration, as it has in other cases challenging its expansive view of presidential power, could turn to appellate courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, in the form of an emergency motion for a stay pending an appeal.

The Supreme Court already has weighed in once on the issue of deportations under the AEA. The justices held that migrants alleged to be gang members must be given “reasonable time” to contest their removal from the country. The court has not specified the length of time.

It’s possible that the losing side in the 5th Circuit would file an emergency appeal with the justices that also would ask them to short-circuit lower court action in favor of a definitive ruling from the nation’s highest court. Such a decision likely would be months away, at least.

The Texas case is just one piece of a tangle of litigation sparked by Trump's proclamation.

The ACLU initially filed suit in the nation's capital to block deportations. U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg issued a temporary hold on removals and ordered the administration turn around planes that had left with detainees headed to El Salvador, a directive that was apparently ignored. Later, the Supreme Court weighed in.

The justices stepped in again late last month with an unusual postmidnight order halting deportations from North Texas, where the ACLU contended the administration was preparing for another round of flights to El Salvador.

Riccardi reported from Denver. Associated Press writers Lindsay Whitehurst and Mark Sherman contributed to this report.

The El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville, Texas is pictured, Thursday, May 1, 2025, after a federal judge in the district barred the Trump administration from deporting any Venezuelans at the south Texas detention center under the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century wartime law. (AP Photo/Valerie Gonzalez)

Detainees held at El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville, Texas are seen outside briefly, Thursday, May 1, 2025, after a federal judge in the district barred the Trump administration from deporting any Venezuelans from South Texas under the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century wartime law. (AP Photo/Valerie Gonzalez)

The El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville, Texas is pictured, Thursday, May 1, 2025, after a federal judge in the district barred the Trump administration from deporting any Venezuelans at the south Texas detention center under the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century wartime law. (AP Photo/Valerie Gonzalez)

The El Valle Detention Center in Raymondville, Texas is pictured, Thursday, May 1, 2025, after a federal judge in the district barred the Trump administration from deporting any Venezuelans at the south Texas detention center under the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century wartime law. (AP Photo/Valerie Gonzalez)

President Donald Trump arrives to speak during a National Day of Prayer event in the Rose Garden of the White House, Thursday, May 1, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)