US aims to deport Kilmar Ábrego García to Liberia despite Costa Rica deal
US aims to deport Kilmar Ábrego García to Liberia despite Costa Rica deal
A Maryland man's fight against deportation continues as the US pushes Liberia as the destination, even after a Costa Rica agreement to accept some third-country cases.
In a case that has become a focal point in the immigration debate, Kilmar Ábrego García, a 30-year-old Salvadoran national living in Maryland, remains at the center of a contentious push to relocate him abroad. Government attorneys told a federal judge that the Department of Homeland Security intends to deport him to Liberia, despite a newly negotiated agreement with Costa Rica that would have the Central American nation accept certain third-country deportees who cannot be returned to their home countries.
Ábrego García’s situation is complicated by a prior mistake: he was deported to El Salvador last year after officials said he did not belong to the country to which he should have been returned. Since then, he has mounted a legal fight against a second deportation route proposed by authorities, which would move him to a string of African nations. A Maryland judge has been skeptical of those plans, noting the government has offered “one empty threat after another” about removing him to countries with little real chance of success while his criminal case progresses.
At a Tuesday hearing, the judge asked for a clearer path forward. DOJ officials suggested Ábrego García might “remove himself” to Costa Rica, but the court has stressed that such a move would be impractical while a Tennessee human smuggling case is active against him. The judge set a briefing schedule and scheduled a new hearing for late April. Ábrego García is married to an American and has a child in Maryland, and he has lived in the United States for years, underscoring the human impact of the policy fight surrounding his case.
The clash highlights the broader tension in U.S. immigration policy: why the government negotiates third-country arrangements at all when individual cases remain unresolved, and whether those arrangements truly offer a viable, humane path for people who have long built lives in the United States. As the legal process unfolds, Ábrego García’s fate remains tied to questions about due process, interstate coordination, and the real-world consequences of top-down deportation strategies.
