Abrego Garcia transferred to Pennsylvania facility, against lawyers’ wishes

Kilmar Abrego Garcia, pictured at center, was released from jail in Putnam County, Tennessee, on August 22, 2025. (John Partipilo/Tennessee Lookout)

WASHINGTON — Attorneys for Kilmar Abrego Garcia, the man who the Trump administration admitted to wrongly deporting in March, said over the weekend that the administration moved him from one U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Virginia to another in Pennsylvania, raising concerns over his access to legal counsel.

In a Saturday legal filing, attorneys representing Abrego Garcia in a criminal case in Tennessee said the federal government’s decision to move him to the Moshannon Valley Processing Center in Phillipsburg, Pennsylvania, has made it difficult to meet and “properly prepare for trial.”

His attorneys also raised concerns over the conditions at the facility, saying that a detainee died by suicide last month.

“There have been recent reports of assaults, inadequate medical care, and insufficient food, and the Department of Homeland Security abruptly terminated an internal investigation into allegations of excessive force and abuses by guards at the facility,” according to the filing. 

Last month, a judge in Maryland signed a temporary restraining order barring the Trump administration from transferring Abrego Garcia more than 200 miles from the federal courthouse in Greenbelt. The facility in Pennsylvania is 189 miles from the courthouse.

In the Maryland case, Abrego Garcia is challenging his removal from the U.S. and asking to remain in the country while he pursues his asylum case. 

Wrongful removal sparked conflict between branches

Abrego Garcia, who was mistakenly removed to a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador, has become a flashpoint between the judicial branch and the administration as President Donald Trump pursues an immigration crackdown. 

The U.S. Supreme Court ordered that the administration must facilitate  Abrego Garcia’s return, and immigration officials brought him back to the U.S. to face criminal charges lodged against him in June.

Shortly after his return, the Trump administration tried to remove him to a third country to comply with removal protections from his home country of El Salvador. The administration has continued efforts to remove Abrego Garcia to Uganda and Eswatini, though Costa Rica has also agreed to accept him as a refugee. 

The Tennessee criminal charges stem from a traffic stop in 2022 that included Abrego Garcia and several people. No charges were filed at the time.

The Department of Justice has alleged that Abrego Garcia took part in a long-running conspiracy to smuggle immigrants without legal status across the United States for money. He’s pleaded not guilty to those charges. 

Asylum denied in 2019

Abrego Garcia came to the U.S. without legal authorization in 2011 when he was 16. He applied for asylum in 2019, but because he did not apply for asylum within his first year in the U.S. – the legal deadline for such claims – authorities denied the application. 

Instead, an immigration judge granted him deportation protections, known as a withholding of removal, because the judge found it likely that Abrego Garcia would face gang violence if he were returned to El Salvador. 

Federal immigration officials at the time didn’t object to the judge’s withholding of removal order and didn’t find a third country to deport Abrego Garcia.

Earlier this year, Abrego Garcia was picking his son up when immigration officials detained him and said his status changed. Days later, he was deported along with hundreds of men to the mega-prison in El Salvador where he later said he experienced psychological and physical torture.