Kilmar Ábrego García detained after reporting to Ice office in Baltimore

Kilmar Ábrego García, whose arrest and fight to stay in the US has become a flashpoint in Donald Trump's immigration crackdown, has been detained after reporting to immigration authorities yesterday.

- Dharna Noor

The 30-year-old was wrongfully deported in March to a prison in his native El Salvador. He was returned to the US in June, but only to face human smuggling charges that his lawyers call preposterous and vindictive.

"The only reason he was taken into detention was to punish him," Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, an attorney representing Ábrego, said outside a Baltimore Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) field office yesterday. "To punish him for exercising his constitutional rights."

The attorney said his client filed a new lawsuit yesterday morning challenging his potential deportation to Uganda and his current confinement.

Ábrego faces deportation to Uganda after declining an offer to be deported to Costa Rica in exchange for remaining in jail and pleading guilty to human smuggling charges, according to a Saturday court filing.

"The fact that they are holding Costa Rica as a carrot and using Uganda as a stick to try to coerce him to plead guilty for a crime is such clear evidence that they are weaponizing the immigration system in a matter that is completely unconstitutional," Sandoval-Moshenberg said.