Abrego Garcia to be arraigned in Nashville courtroom; his attorneys are fighting to free him

The Fred D. Thompson federal courthouse, where Kilmar Abrego Garcia is set to be arraigned. (Photo: John Partipilo/Tennessee Lookout)

Photograph by John Partipilo/Tennessee Lookout ©2025

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man Trump Administration officials wrongly deported to a Salvadoran prison, is scheduled to be arraigned today in a downtown Nashville courtroom as immigrant rights advocates, union leaders and clergy gather at a nearby church in a show of support and protest.

Abrego Garcia will have the opportunity to enter a plea to two criminal charges of alien smuggling. A magistrate judge will also consider the government’s arguments to detain Abrego Garcia until trial. 

His court-appointed public defenders, filing their first written response to the government’s criminal case on Wednesday, argued Abrego Garcia should remain free until his trial date, which has not yet been set. The attorneys’ 20-page legal filing focused largely on the government’s controversial actions to date.

“With no legal process whatsoever, the United States government illegally detained and deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia and shipped him to the Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT) in El Salvador, one of the most violent, inhumane prisons in the world. The government now asks this Court to detain him further,” they wrote.

Federal prosecutors in Nashville ask judge to keep Abrego Garcia detained until trial

“Mr. Abrego Garcia asks the Court for what he has been denied in the past several months — due process.”

The fate of Abrego Garcia has been central to public pushback over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement tactics, which have since spilled into a days-long protest in Los Angeles. The Trump administration responded by activating the National Guard and U.S. Marines.

Immigrant rights advocates, clergy and union leaders are expected to gather in solidarity with Abrego Garcia today at a downtown church near the federal courthouse “to defend due process, protect vulnerable communities, and expose the dangerous authoritarianism driving these abuses.”  

On Saturday, while a military parade and celebration of President Donald Trump’s birthday take place in Washington, D.C., so-called “No Kings” protests of the Trump administration’s immigration and other policies are planned across the country, including more than a dozen in Tennessee. 

Abrego Garcia was driving home with his five-year-old son when was pulled over in March. Within days, he was dispatched to an El Salvador prison along with scores of other detainees.

‘A stain on the Constitution’: Abrego Garcia lawyers refuse to drop his case against U.S.

An immigrant from El Salvador, Abrego Garcia illegally came to the U.S. as a teen. In 2019 an immigration court issued an order that allowed him to reside in the United States while his immigration case was considered. The order specifically barred the federal government from deporting him to El Salvador, where, he said, he feared gang violence. 

A Trump administration attorney later admitted his deportation to El Salvador in March was in error.

In April, the Supreme Court ordered the federal government to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return. 

It wasn’t until Friday that Abrego Garcia was ultimately returned to the United States to face two criminal charges in Nashville. 

The charges are tied to a 2022 traffic stop in Putnam County, about 80 miles east of Nashville. 

Abrego Garcia was not arrested or charged in the stop, but federal prosecutors now allege that a subsequent investigation uncovered his ties to the MS-13 gang and a scheme to smuggle migrants illegally around the country for financial gain. 

Prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee argued in legal filings this week that Abrego Garcia should remain in detention until trial because of the seriousness of the alleged crimes.

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, wrongly deported to El Salvador prison, to face federal charges in Nashville

His alleged human smuggling activities involved children at times, his alleged gang affiliation makes him — and gang associates — a danger to potential witnesses and the potential sentence he faces makes him a flight risk, they sayProsecutors also argued that Abrego Garcia faces certain deportation to El Salvador if convicted, giving him further motivation to flee.

Defense attorneys said allegations of Abrego Garcia’s gang affiliations are “baseless” and noted that he has not been charged with a crime that involves a minor victim.

Abrego Garcia has no prior felony convictions and no history of evading arrest or intimidating witnesses, they wrote.

And, they wrote, the government’s wrongful deportation of Abrego Garcia in March may give him a stronger claim in immigration proceedings to fight attempts to deport him once again should he be convicted. 

“Indeed, Mr Abrego Garcia was recently illegally deported to El Salvador and confined in a notoriously inhuman Salvadoran prison,” they wrote. 

“Thus, it appears he may now have a new basis (under either asylum law and/or the Convention Against Torture) to seek additional protection against deportation to El Salvador.”

MEMORANDUM IN OPPOSITION TO GOVERNMENT’S MOTION FOR A DETENTION HEARING