Abrego Garcia was deported last month by the Trump administration, which says he is a member of MS-13.
A federal judge on Wednesday gave the Justice Department another week to provide information on its efforts to return deported illegal migrant and suspected MS-13 gang member Kilmar Abrego Garcia back to the U.S.
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis granted the Justice Department a seven-day stay until April 30 to provide testimony and documents related to a case which has drawn a sharp wedge between Democrats and Republicans.
Drew Ensign, a deputy assistant attorney general, filed a sealed motion requesting the stay, with lawyers for Abrego Garcia filing a response in opposition to the government’s motion to halt the order. It was under seal in the Maryland federal court.
Xinis didn’t explain her legal reasoning but wrote that it was made “with the agreement of the parties.”
The administration was also seeking relief from having to file daily updates, but Xinis’ stay did not make any changes to that requirement.
The Wednesday evening order came just one day after Xinis blasted the administration’s lawyers in a written filing for ignoring her orders in refusing to provide the daily status updates on the case, saying that they had been acting in “bad faith” by obstructing the legal process.
“That ends now,” said Xinis, who was nominated to the bench by former President Barack Obama.
“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 in an eight-page order. “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.”