(Ken Silva, Headline USA) A federal judge has given the Trump administration until 6 p.m. today to explain the steps it’s taken, if any, to free a “mistakenly” deported man from an El Salvador prison and return him to the U.S.
Meanwhile, evidence continues to be reported about the fact that the deported man, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, was likely an MS-13 gang member involved in human smuggling—contrary to reports from liberal media outlets, who’ve referred to the El Salvadorian illegal immigrant as a “Maryland man.”
Last week, it was revealed that Garcia was suspected by Tennessee Highway Patrol (THP) of human trafficking in 2022 during a traffic stop, and that the FBI ordered him to be released. On Tuesday, Just the News reported more facts about that 2022 traffic stop—revealing that Garcia was found to have been driving a vehicle owned by a human smuggler.
“When Abrego Garcia was stopped in 2022 by the Tennessee state trooper, Homeland Security intelligence created a record of the encounter … The El Salvadoran was driving a black 2001 Chevrolet Suburban and said he was transporting his passengers to Maryland from Texas for construction work, although the state trooper found no luggage in the SUV,” Just the News reported.
“Homeland Security documents identified the owner of the vehicle as Jose Ramon Hernandez Reyes. Abrego Garcia told the state trooper that the owner was his boss. However, that SUV was flagged separately by the Homeland Security Investigations Baltimore field office as belonging to a target they suspected of human trafficking or smuggling.”
Just the News quoted Homeland Security records, which stated: “Vehicle is used by HSI Baltimore target in human smuggling/trafficking operation. Vehicle makes trips to southern border to pick up non-citizens.”
The details of Abrego Garcia’s relationship with Reyes, who was deported for human trafficking in 2021. As has been previously reported, Abrego Garcia was transporting seven other people at the time of the 2022 traffic stop, and he told THP officers that he had spent the last three days driving from Houston, Texas to Temple Hills, Maryland, “to bring in people to perform construction work.”
NEW: DHS has provided @FoxNews a bodycam image & HSI report from when Kilmar Abrego Garcia was pulled over by Tennessee Highway Patrol & was suspected of human trafficking in 2022. Per report, he had 8 people w/ no luggage in the car w/ him, & claimed to be driving them from TX… pic.twitter.com/d2uU6YuVKx
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) April 18, 2025
“There was no luggage in the vehicle, leading the encountering officer to suspect this was a human trafficking incident,” a 2022 Tennessee police report said. “All the passengers gave the same home address as the subject’s home address. During the interview, subject pretended to speak less English than he was capable of and attempted to put encountering officer off-track by responding to questions with questions.”
Revelations about the 2022 traffic stop follow previous reports about a Maryland police report from three years earlier. According to that March 2019 Maryland police report, Abrego Garcia was spotted loitering at a Home Depot parking lot around 2:30 p.m. with three other men. Two of the other men were confirmed to be MS-13 members, while police said they couldn’t determine the affiliation of a third man. Abrego Garcia was also strongly suspected of being with MS-13, according to the report.
Along with Abrego Garcia’s potential gang activities, it has been revealed that Abrego Garcia’s wife filed a restraining order against him in 2021 over domestic violence allegations.
Abrego Garcia illegally immigrated to the U.S. in 2012, and two judges deemed him a likely member of MS-13 in 2019. However, former U.S. Immigration Judge David M. Jones reportedly granted Abrego Garcia’s request for a “withholding of removal” order in 2019, based on his claim that gangs threatened his family in El Salvador and Guatemala.
“He has established past persecution based on a protected ground, and the presumption of a well-founded fear of future persecution. DHS has not shown there are changed circumstances in Guatemala that would result in the Respondent’s life not being threatened, or that internal relocation is possible and reasonable under the circumstances,” Judge Jones said at the time, referring to the fact that his family was purportedly receiving threats from the Guatemalan gang Barrio 18.
When Abrego Garcia was deported last month, a DOJ lawyer attributed it to a “clerical error.” That DOJ lawyer, Erez Reuveni, was then placed on administrative leave before he was fired.
“The only mistake that was made is a lawyer put an incorrect line in a legal filing that since has been relieved of duty,” White House aide Stephen Miller said of Reuveni’s firing.
The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Trump administration nearly two weeks ago to facilitate Abrego Garcia’s return to the U.S. from a notorious Salvadoran prison, rejecting the White House’s claim that it couldn’t retrieve him after mistakenly deporting him.
Trump administration officials have pushed back, arguing that it is up to El Salvador — though the president of El Salvador has also said he lacks the power to return Abrego Garcia. The administration has also argued that information about any steps it has taken or could take to return Abrego Garcia is protected by attorney-client privilege laws, state secret laws, general “government privilege” or other secrecy rules.
But on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis said those claims, without any facts to back them up, reflected a “willful and bad faith refusal to comply with discovery obligations.”
“For weeks, Defendants have sought refuge behind vague and unsubstantiated assertions of privilege, using them as a shield to obstruct discovery and evade compliance with this Court’s orders,” Xinis wrote an the order Tuesday. “Defendants have known, at least since last week, that this Court requires specific legal and factual showings to support any claim of privilege. Yet they have continued to rely on boilerplate assertions. That ends now.”
She gave the administration until 6 p.m. Wednesday (today) to provide those details.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Ken Silva is the editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.
