Kilmar Abrego García, wrongly deported to El Salvador by Washington, is now threatened with deportation to Uganda

Lawyers for Kilmar Abrego García, the immigrant wrongly deported to El Salvador in March and then brought back to the United States in June, accused the Trump administration on Saturday of trying to “coerce” him into pleading guilty in his criminal case by threatening to send him “halfway around the world” to Uganda, the New York Times reported.

The “tortuous path” taken by the American authorities in the case of Mr. Abrego García for more than five months “suggests that their main objective has always been to get rid of a legal and political problem that has caused them problems and embarrassed them,” the American daily judges.

The story of this legal saga – an exemplary illustration, for Donald Trump's critics, of the "errors" of his immigration policy – ​​began on March 15, when immigration services expelled this 30-year-old Salvadoran to his country of origin, along with more than 250 men accused of belonging to a gang.

The Trump administration had acknowledged an “administrative error,” as the young man, who was in the United States illegally but married to an American woman, had been protected since 2019 by a court decision prohibiting his deportation.

When he was brought back to the United States in June, his case took another turn: to everyone's surprise, he was immediately charged and imprisoned for migrant smuggling. He pleaded not guilty, his trial was set for January 27, 2027, and a federal judge ordered his release on Friday, August 22, pending trial.

Mr. Abrego García was released on Friday and returned to his wife and home in Maryland. But the case has become even more complicated.

Because according to his lawyers, the day before his release, “federal prosecutors urged him to take a deal: plead guilty to two counts of human trafficking, serve his sentence and be deported to Costa Rica,” a “Spanish-speaking tropical haven considered the safest country in Central America,” reports the Washington Post .

“When he declined the offer, preferring to await his trial with his family in Maryland, authorities threatened to deport him in the coming days to Uganda, an African country where the State Department advises against travel due to the persistent risk of terrorist attacks,” the newspaper added.

As early as Friday, an ICE lawyer informed Abrego García's representatives that he should report to ICE's Baltimore offices on Monday, August 25. Authorities could then deport him "no sooner than 72 hours after" his arrival at the facility, according to USA Today .

The truth is, "it's unclear what might happen next," the New York Times claims. If the young man refuses to plead guilty, "prosecutors will likely have to drop the charges" against him in order to "deport him again," the newspaper explains. A rather bizarre situation, to say the least.

On Friday, prosecutors told the young man's lawyers that the offer to plead guilty, followed by deportation to Costa Rica after serving his sentence, would be valid until Monday, "otherwise this offer would be definitively abandoned," CNN reports.

“There can be only one interpretation of these events: the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, and ICE are using their collective powers to force Mr. Abrego to choose between a guilty plea followed by relative safety, or extradition to Uganda, where his safety and liberty would be threatened,” Mr. Abrego García’s lawyers said in a submission to the judge in charge of the case.

For them, these latest developments prove that the government is seeking to "punish" their client for having challenged in court "his wrongful expulsion" last March. "This case should be dismissed."