Supreme Court Stays Lower Court Order to Retrieve Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador

Shortly before a Court of Appeals declined to stay District Court Judge Paula Xinis’ order to retrieve Kilmar Abrego Garcia from El Salvador before midnight, the government turned to the Supreme Court, where Chief Justice John Roberts obliged.

Roberts issued a temporary administrative stay, which relieves the government of its obligation to meet the midnight deadline. An administrative stay has nothing to do with the merits of a case.

The government admits it sent Abrego Garcia to the CECOT prison in El Salvador by mistake, despite his legal protected status to live and work in the USA and despite an immigration judge’s order that if he was ever expelled from the country he must not be sent to El Salvador.

Although people the USA sent to CECOT are kept there on a contract with the government of El Salvador, the Department of Justice now says that retrieving anyone from there is a matter of diplomacy rather than a contractual matter.

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