Justice Department pushes to revive criminal case against Kilmar Abrego
Garcia
[August 19, 2026]
By TRAVIS LOLLER
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The Justice Department is pushing to revive
criminal charges against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, telling a federal appeals
court late Monday that a judge erred in his scathing ruling that called
the case against the man mistakenly deported to an El Salvador prison an
“abuse of prosecuting power.”
The government is appealing the May ruling by U.S. District Judge
Waverly Crenshaw that threw out charges of human smuggling against the
Salvadoran national. The ruling amounted to an extraordinary rebuke of a
Justice Department that under President Donald Trump has repeatedly been
accused of targeting defendants for political purposes.
Crenshaw found that Abrego Garcia would never have faced criminal
charges had he not successfully sued the government over his 2025
deportation. The ruling was an embarrassment for the Trump
administration, which only brought him back after securing a criminal
indictment against him.
Crenshaw stopped short of finding the government acted with “actual
vindictiveness,” a rarely-met standard that usually requires evidence
like a prosecutor admitting that charges were filed in retaliation
against someone. But the judge did find there was enough evidence of
“presumptive vindictiveness.” That included the timing of the
indictment.
Homeland Security had been aware of the 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee
that was the basis for the human smuggling charges for more than two
years before Abrego Garcia was deported. The agency only reopened the
case and began investigating in earnest after Abrego Garcia was ordered
returned to the U.S.
Crenshaw also found that statements by U.S. Attorney General Todd
Blanche, who was a deputy at the time, suggested the Justice Department
was targeting Abrego Garcia because he won his wrongful-deportation
case.
In a brief filed Monday night with the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals, federal prosecutors argued that Crenshaw got it wrong.
Blanche’s statements, they argue, demonstrated a legitimate motive for
prosecuting him. His rationale reflected a “normal assessment of the
societal interest in punishment,” not an “improper penalty,” they said.
The statements “explained that the government was seeking to protect the
public and confirm its prior assertions about Abrego's criminal
activity," the brief states.
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Kilmar Abrego Garcia arrives at the federal courthouse, Feb. 26,
2026, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, File)
But even if Blanche's statements reflected an animus against Abrego
Garcia, they are irrelevant because the person who actually brought
the charges was then-Acting U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of
Tennessee Rob McGuire, the brief states — rehashing an argument
thoroughly rejected by Crenshaw that McGuire's motives were the only
motives that mattered in the case.
Crenshaw's ruling noted the sustained oversight of the case by top
Justice Department officials, including regular communications
between McGuire and Associate Deputy Attorney General Aakash Singh,
in finding that the criminal case was thoroughly tainted. Crenshaw
also noted that prosecutors never called as a witness the
investigator who actually reopened the case, to explain why.
Abrego Garcia, 31, is a Salvadoran citizen with an American wife and
child who has lived in Maryland for years although he immigrated to
the U.S. illegally as a teenager. A 2019 order by an immigration
judge prohibited his deportation to El Salvador, finding he had a
“well founded fear” of a gang that had targeted his family there.
The judge allowed him to live and work in the U.S. under Immigration
and Customs Enforcement supervision, but he was not given residency
status.
Blocked from re-deporting Abrego Garcia to El Salvador, the Trump
administration has vowed to deport him to a third county,
threatening to send him to Uganda, Eswatini, Ghana and, most
recently, Liberia. Abrego Garcia has said he would agree to be
deported to Costa Rica, which has said they will accept him, but the
government has so far declined to send him there.
He is fighting deportation to Liberia in a separate federal court
case in Maryland.
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