Judge Demands ‘daily Updates’ On Trump Admin Effort To Return Illegally Deported Man

GREENBELT, Maryland — An exasperated federal judge commanded the Trump administration Friday to begin providing “daily updates” on whether it is doing anything to comply with her order to return a Maryland man — illegally deported to El Salvador last month — back to the United States.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis scolded the administration for refusing to provide even “basic” details about Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s location, despite her demand for an update by Friday morning.

“I’m asking a very simple question. Where is he?” Xinis asked Justice Department attorneys at a court hearing.

“I do not have that information,” replied Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign.

The administration’s stonewalling, which Xinis described as “extremely troubling,” raised the specter that it is defying the order that the judge issued last week and that the Supreme Court largely upheld on Thursday.

Xinis said that without any information — or even an acknowledgment that the administration had done anything at all — she could only conclude that the administration had “done nothing to facilitate the return of Mr. Abrego Garcia.”

“There’s an easy way to combat that,” she said, “and that’s just to tell me whether you’ve done anything and if so, what.”

Xinis’ new directive requires the daily updates to come from an administration official with “personal knowledge” of efforts to return Abrego Garcia to the United States. But Justice Department officials say they may not be prepared to comply with her demands until at least Monday.

Xinis first ordered the administration to “facilitate” the return of Abrego Garcia on April 4. The judge noted Friday that her order was in effect for three days before Chief Justice John Roberts paused it on Monday to give the justices time to weigh the matter. And Roberts’ pause ended Thursday night when the Supreme Court upheld the part of her order requiring the administration to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return.

The Trump administration has acknowledged that immigration officials wrongly deported Abrego Garcia to El Salvador on March 15, in violation of a 2019 immigration court order that barred his deportation to that country because of a credible fear of persecution by a local gang. He was taken with other deportees to a notorious anti-terrorism prison in El Salvador.