The Trump administration filed notice it intends to appeal the dismissal of its Tennessee criminal case against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, whose mistaken deportation to an El Salvador prison last year served as an early flashpoint over the administration’s immigration enforcement tactics.
Last month, a federal judge in Nashville dismissed human smuggling charges against Abrego, as he is referred to in court documents. U.S. District Court Judge Waverly Crenshaw ruled the charges were brought by the federal government to retaliate against Abrego after he successfully challenged his deportation. Crenshaw called the prosecution of Abrego “vindictive and selective.”
Abrego, 30, entered the United States from El Salvador illegally as a teen, living in Maryland and working as a sheet metal worker apprentice. A 2019 order issued by an immigration judge barred his deportation back to the country he said he fled under fear of gang violence. A federal attorney admitted his deportation, in March 2025, was in error.
Abrego’s challenge to his deportation reached the Supreme Court, which ordered the Trump administration to facilitate his return.
The government returned Abrego to the U.S. in June 2025 and sent him straight to a Tennessee detention center, where he was held on human smuggling charges tied to a years-old traffic stop. Federal attorneys alleged that Abrego had served as a driver in an ongoing conspiracy to transport immigrants without legal status throughout the country. Abrego pleaded not guilty to the charges. Back in the United States, Abrego described being tortured in El Salvador after his wrongful deportation.
The government’s notice of appeal sends the case to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.
Abrego faces a separate fight in a Maryland court over the government’s continued efforts to deport him.
Federal lawyers for months have sought to send him to multiple African nations; lawyers for Abrego have said he is willing to be sent instead to Costa Rica. In a reversal last month, newly appointed Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin told Congress that he is willing to send Abrego to Costa Rica. The case remains ongoing.
