Left to right: Kilmar Abrego Garcia attends a protest rally at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Baltimore, Monday, Aug. 25, 2025 (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough), Kristi Noem speaks during a news conference at the Nashville International Airport, Thursday, July 17, 2025, in Nashville, Tennessee (AP Photo/George Walker IV), Pam Bondi speaks at a press briefing in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room in the White House in Washington, DC on Friday, June 27, 2025 (Annabelle Gordon/Sipa USA/AP Images).
Attorneys representing Kilmar Abrego Garcia filed a motion on Thursday asking a judge to issue a gag order against several Trump administration officials – but especially against U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi and Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem.
The request comes as part of Abrego Garcia”s criminal case on human smuggling charges in Tennessee, overseen by U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw, Jr., a Barack Obama appointee.
This follows back-and-forth motions over each party’s respective media strategies in the high-profile case, which became a flashpoint in President Donald Trump’s second-term immigration agenda.
“Since Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia was released from pretrial custody last Friday, officials from the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security — and even the White House — have attacked Mr. Abrego in the media in numerous highly prejudicial, inflammatory, and false statements,” the motion begins.
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Earlier this week, Abrego Garcia’s attorneys brushed off the Trump administration’s own complaints that the defendant was courting media coverage. The lawyers also used the opportunity to accuse administration officials of “leaking and speaking openly to the media” while “crowing about its impending deportation” of their client to the African nation of Uganda.
The latest filing marks the third time the defense has raised the issue that such public statements might negatively impact Abrego Garcia’s right to a fair trial.
The 15-page motion asked the court to order Bondi, Noem, and “all DOJ and DHS officials involved in [the] case” to “refrain from making extrajudicial comments that pose a substantial likelihood of materially prejudicing this proceeding.”
While impetus for the request is the recent spate of negative commentary from high-ranking officials after his release on bail, the motion says the invective is nothing new – but argues the comments have a real shot at upturning the carriage of adversarial justice itself.
“As Mr. Abrego has described in previous submissions, ever since he sued the government to enjoin his unlawful removal to El Salvador, numerous government officials have vilified him in the media — and these baseless public attacks have continued even after he was indicted in this District,” the motion goes on. “Mr. Abrego’s release from pretrial detention reignited the efforts of officials across the Executive Branch — and particularly at DHS — to besmirch both Mr. Abrego and the courts in a campaign to try this case in the court of public opinion.”
Noem is singled out as particularly culpable.
Within “minutes” of Abrego Garcia’s release from pretrial detention, the DHS head issued a statement criticizing “[a]ctivist liberal judges” for “attempt[ing] to obstruct our law enforcement every step of the way in removing the worst of the worst criminal illegal aliens from our country,” the motion notes. Noem went on to criticize the judge in Abrego Garcia’s civil case for being the “publicity hungry Maryland judge” who allowed a “MS-13 gang member, human trafficker, serial domestic abuser, and child predator” to go free, the motion further explains.
But Noem was not alone, the motion makes clear.
The White House stated its own disparagement of Abrego Garcia immediately after his release. Then, DHS issued a separate press release quoting Noem’s earlier statement. Later, when Abrego Garcia was back home in the Old Line State, White House border czar Tom Homan said the defendant is “not going to walk the streets of this nation” and called him a “criminal alien,” the motion catalogues.
Once Abrego Garcia returned to Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention on Aug. 25, both Trump and Bondi took to the dais at a White House press conference to further comment on his case, according to the motion.
Left to right: A stylized image of Kilmar Abrego Garcia (White House), Abrego Garcia in detention (DHS), Jennifer Vasquez Sura, left, hugs her husband Kilmar Abrego Garcia at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Baltimore, Aug. 25, 2025 (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough).
“[W]e’ve got him under control, he will no longer terrorize our country,” Bondi said in response to a question. “He’s currently charged with human smuggling, including children. The guy needs to be in prison, he doesn’t need to be on the streets like all these liberals want him to be.… We are going to keep America safe from all of these foreign terrorist organizations, including Abrego Garcia.”
During that same press conference, the 45th and 47th president said Abrego Garcia’s “wife is afraid to even talk about him,” which does not appear to be true. Trump himself is not named in the gag order request.
The motion cited a local rule and the right to a fair trial in its request for the gag order. The motion further asked the court to, at the very least, force the government’s lawyers to provide an accounting of steps it has taken to comply with an earlier order directing “all counsel” to abide by federal and Volunteer State attorney rules regarding extrajudicial statements that could harm a defendant in the eyes of the public.
The motion also cautions – perhaps setting the stage for another kind of filing entirely – negative comments from the Trump administration may have already infected the prosecution beyond salvation.
“Further intervention from the Court is necessary to protect Mr. Abrego’s right to a fair trial and the integrity of these proceedings,” the motion argues. “The government’s ongoing barrage of prejudicial statements severely threaten — and perhaps have already irrevocably impaired — the ability to try this case at all — in any venue. If the government is allowed to continue in this way, it will taint any conceivable jury pool by exposing the entire country to irrelevant, prejudicial, and false claims about Mr. Abrego.”
