Name: Kilmar Abrego Garcia released from ICE detention, attorney says
Uploaded: 2025-12-12T00:16:27.991Z
Duration: 3 min 19 s
Description: Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man mistakenly deported to El Salvador and later returned to the U.S., has officially been released from ICE custody, his attorney says. This comes after a federal judge in Maryland ordered his release earlier Thursday. CBS News justice reporter Jake Rosen has more.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the Maryland man mistakenly deported to El Salvador and later returned to the U.S., has officially been released from ICE custody, his attorney says. This comes after a federal judge in Maryland ordered his release earlier Thursday. CBS News justice reporter Jake Rosen has more.

Maryland

Kilmar Abrego Garcia was released from ICE custody after a federal judge in Maryland determined there was no removal order against him, preventing the Department of Justice and Homeland Security from holding him further. Abrego Garcia had previously been deported to El Salvador but returned to the United States to pursue due process after being identified in government-released photos and facing criminal charges.

The case took approximately seven months and involved multiple detentions and judicial rulings. Separately, a grand jury in Virginia declined to indict New York Attorney General Letitia James on alleged mortgage fraud charges, marking the second such refusal in a week. The Department of Justice has not commented on whether further attempts will be made.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia released from ICE detention, attorney says

The attorney for Kilmar Abrego-Garcia tells CBS News that he is officially out of his ICE custody, this after a federal judge in Maryland today ordered that he be released. Jake Rosen joins me now. Jake, this is a breaking news story, not that the order came down. That happened earlier today, but the release has been achieved. Walk us through what we know. Well, Major, what we know right now is that Kilmar Abrego-Garcia is likely on his way out of an ICE detention center in Pennsylvania, potentially going towards where his family lives in Maryland, potentially somewhere else. That we do not know. And this all stems from this ruling earlier today in which a federal judge said that there was no order for his removal, and thus the Department of Justice and Homeland Security cannot continue holding him in ICE detention. Should remind our audience that he was deported to El Salvador as part of those flights back in March. Attorneys representing him, after his wife raised alarms about his whereabouts, said that she had seen him in some of the pictures that were released from the PR put out by the Salvadoran government. And as a result, he was one of very few men who were able to go to court in the United States to stand up for due process. This judge, it only took—as justice moves slow in these cases, you know, seven or so months to get to this point. It took him being brought back here to face criminal charges. Then it took him being re-detained by ICE after a judge in that criminal case said that the Department of Justice did not have enough evidence that he would potentially be violent if he were to roam the streets or to go back to Maryland. And ICE re-detained him after that judge freed him from pretrial detention there. Jake, we ask a lot of you in this justice space, because many things happen day to day. Another thing happened today, different subject. Another grand jury presented evidence potentially to indict sitting New York Attorney General Letitia James, and that grand jury said no. Catch us up. Yep. It's the second time in a week. A grand jury was set up this week in Alexandria, Virginia. That's where a group of Virginians said no, that they did not abide by over 50 percent to indict Letitia James for charges of alleged mortgage fraud. This same thing happened last week in Norfolk, Virginia, when the Department of Justice tried again. They've tried twice and failed twice now. Why, Major, do they keep continuing to do this? Well, it's because a federal judge from South Carolina was brought into Virginia to hear arguments last month on whether or not Lindsey Halligan, that former White House aide who was put into the Eastern District of Virginia, to directly enact what President Trump had ordered on Truth Social to Attorney General Pam Bondi, to prosecute his enemies. That included Letitia James. That includes Senator Adam Schiff. That includes former FBI Director James Comey. The Comey and Letitia James indictments were dismissed by this judge. The Department of Justice has not appealed that ruling because the Trump administration's strategy for continuing this way of appointing prosecutors without congressional and Senate approval has failed in the appeals court, in district courts. And so now the Department of Justice did not comment to us when we asked if they were going to continue to do this. But our colleague Scott McFarlane reports that at least one Trump administration official said that it is likely the Trump administration is going to continue to attempt to indict Letitia James in Virginia in the coming days and weeks as we head to the new year. And we will follow that if that transpires, and what a grand jury does or doesn't do about it.

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