Kilmar Abrego, the migrant whose wrongful deportation to El Salvador made him a symbol of U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration policies, appears for a check-in at the ICE Baltimore field office, a day after his release from criminal custody in Pennsylvania, in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S., December 12, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Kilmar Abrego, the migrant whose wrongful deportation to El Salvador made him a symbol of U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration policies, appears for a check-in at the ICE Baltimore field office, a day after his release from criminal custody in Pennsylvania, in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S., December 12, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Kilmar Abrego, the migrant whose wrongful deportation to El Salvador made him a symbol of U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration policies, appears for a check-in at the ICE Baltimore field office, a day after his release from criminal custody in Pennsylvania, in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S., December 12, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Kilmar Abrego, the migrant whose wrongful deportation to El Salvador made him a symbol of U.S. President Donald Trump's aggressive immigration policies, appears for a check-in at the ICE Baltimore field office, a day after his release from criminal custody in Pennsylvania, in Baltimore, Maryland, U.S., December 12, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein

By Mike Scarcella

WASHINGTON, Dec 12 (Reuters) - A federal judge on Friday blocked an effort to have Kilmar Abrego returned to custody a day after his release from detention.

Abrego, whose wrongful deportation became a flashpoint in President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, was released from an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Pennsylvania on Thursday evening after U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis ordered his release on a temporary basis.

Following that ruling, an immigration judge filed a new order saying Abrego must report back to Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody by 8 a.m. Friday morning. Abrego's lawyers then asked the judge to issue a temporary restraining order to block the new immigration detention order.

Xinis, of U.S. District Court in Maryland, granted his lawyers' request Friday morning, preventing immigration authorities from re-detaining Abrego.

"For the public to have any faith in the orderly administration of justice, the court’s narrowly crafted remedy cannot be so quickly and easily upended without further briefing and consideration," Xinis wrote.

Abrego's immigration battle began in March when Abrego was wrongfully deported to a prison in his native El Salvador and then brought back to the U.S. in June to face human smuggling charges.

His case has become a symbol of the Trump administration's aggressive immigration crackdown, with Trump officials portraying Abrego as a danger to public safety and critics accusing the administration of trampling legal rights in its bid to deport millions living illegally in the United States.

(Reporting by Mike Scarcella and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Katharine Jackson)