Judge weighs Liberia deportation for Prince George's County resident Abrego Garcia

A Greenbelt federal courtroom became the center of a fast-moving immigration fight for Prince George’s County on Tuesday, as Judge Paula Xinis weighed whether Kilmar Abrego Garcia could be sent to Liberia if existing injunctions are lifted.

The immediate question was speed. The Department of Homeland Security had already told the court in March that Liberia remained willing to accept Abrego Garcia and that Immigration and Customs Enforcement could arrange a charter flight in roughly five days if the order blocking removal were lifted. On Tuesday, Xinis pressed Justice Department lawyers on whether he would be physically removed within a week. DOJ attorney Ernesto Molina said he would be surprised if Abrego Garcia were still in the United States a week after being taken into custody.

That exchange put hard numbers on what had been an abstract legal dispute for local families watching from Prince George’s County. If the court’s injunctions fall, ICE could move quickly from custody to deportation, with Liberia emerging as the administration’s current destination after earlier third-country options were floated. The government has argued that the court order is the remaining obstacle. Abrego Garcia’s lawyers say the effort goes further, testing how far federal officials can push removal while a judge is still policing the case.

The stakes are higher because Abrego Garcia’s immigration history is already tangled with previous court action. An immigration judge granted him protection from deportation to El Salvador in 2019, finding he had a well-founded fear of gang violence. He had lived in Maryland for years, and he has an American wife and child. Earlier in 2025, he was mistakenly deported to El Salvador and later returned to the United States in June to face human smuggling charges.

The Liberia push is not the first time the government has tried to find a third-country destination. Court filings and prior reporting show ICE had already filed notice of a Liberia deportation plan as early as October, when Liberia was one of several African countries considered. Abrego Garcia’s attorneys have argued that he has no meaningful cultural or personal ties to Liberia and have pointed to Costa Rica as a country he said he would accept because it had promised legal immigrant status.

The case, filed March 24, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland and assigned to Xinis, has become a test of court oversight as much as immigration policy. For Prince George’s County residents, the Greenbelt hearing showed how quickly a county neighbor’s case can turn into a national check on federal power, with one ruling potentially moving a family from Maryland to Liberia in days.