Kilmar Abrego Garcia urges supporters to ‘continue to fight’ as he checks into ICE facility

CNN

By Alison Main, Devan Cole, CNN

(CNN) — Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man who was unlawfully deported to El Salvador earlier this year, urged supporters at a rally to “continue to fight (and) resist” before he checked in at the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Baltimore on Monday.

Before entering the federal building in Maryland around 7:30 am ET, Abrego Garcia gathered with members of his family, immigration activists, community leaders and elected officials at a rally. His attorney told CNN that he expects Abrego Garcia to be taken into custody, though ICE hasn’t confirmed if that’s the case.

“Regardless of what happens today in my ICE check-in, promise me this,” Abrego Garcia said through a translator before reporting to the facility on Monday. “Promise me that you will continue to pray, continue to fight, resist and love, not just for me, but for everybody.”

His comments come as the Trump administration warned it could send Abrego Garcia to Uganda as soon as this week. He returned home at the end of last week from Tennessee, where he was being held pending trial in a federal human smuggling case.

Lydia Walther-Rodriguez, the chief of organizing and leadership at CASA, the group behind the rally, argued that Abrego Garcia is being made a “martyr for having the courage to stand up to this administration’s illegal deportation practices.”

“They’re throwing the entire federal apparatus at one father of three to prove that no one should dare challenge their authority,” she continued in statement.

A Department of Homeland Security official notified Abrego Garcia’s lawyers on Friday that the agency might try to deport the Salvadoran national to Uganda in the coming days. The notice came just minutes after he was released from criminal custody pending his trial, which is set to begin in January.

The Trump administration brought Abrego Garcia back to the US in June to face the federal charges after sending him in mid-March to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador, in violation of a 2019 court order that prohibited his removal to the Central American country.

For now, per an order by a federal judge in Maryland, Abrego Garcia is under supervision by the ICE Baltimore field office, where he must occasionally check in with an immigration officer. Under that order, he is supposed to be allowed to continue to work and live in the state. But the judge has not barred the Trump administration from deporting him to a third country, like Uganda, so long as officials do not violate his due process rights.

Activists joining Abrego Garcia on Monday morning accuse the Trump administration of “retaliating” against him for fighting against his deportation and trying to exercise his constitutional rights.

Abrego Garcia’s lawyers also argued in court papers Saturday that offers by the administration to eventually deport him to Costa Rica in exchange for his guilty plea were evidence of the government’s effort to punish him for challenging his wrongful deportation. They told the judge in his criminal case that their client now has until Monday morning “to accept a plea in exchange for deportation to Costa Rica, or else that offer will be off the table forever.”

Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen said he spoke to Abrego Garcia on Sunday for the first time since they met in El Salvador in April. The Democratic senator said he told the father of three and his wife that “we will stay in this fight for justice and due process.”

“If his rights are denied, the rights of everyone else are at risk,” Van Hollen wrote in a statement posted on X.

Before reporting to the facility, Abrego Garcia said memories of his family sustained him during his detention.

“When I was detained, I remembered memories with my family: going to the park with them, going to the trampoline with my children,” he said. “Those moments will continue to give me hope to continue in this fight.”

CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez and Michael Williams contributed to this report.

The story and headline have been updated with additional information.

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