Ahead of a federal court hearing on Friday, Jennifer Vasquez Sura stood in front of news cameras and outlets from across the country. It was her first public appearance since the news of her husband’s deportation made national news headlines earlier this week.

“If I had all the money in the world, I'll spend it all just to buy one thing: a phone call to hear Kilmar’s voice again and have the opportunity to talk to him and the kids again,” said Sura through tears. 

Federal Judge Paula Xinis agrees that Sura should have her husband back.

Xinis ruled from the federal courthouse in Greenbelt that the U.S. government must take immediate steps to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia to his family in Beltsville, Maryland, telling Justice Department lawyers that Abrego Garcia’s deportation was “an illegal act.”

Abrego Garcia had work authorization and lived in the United States permanently.

After his arrest, the Trump administration admitted to an “administrative error” in Abrego Garcia’s arrest and subsequent deportation to an El Savador mega prison. But the administration claimed they could not bring him back because he is in foreign custody.

Sura and the three children that she and Garcia share are all U.S. citizens. Standing with advocates from CASA, a Maryland-based immigrants’ rights organization, she recounted Garcia’s last words which were said to her as he was being handcuffed in front of her and their five-year old son.

“Si fueres fuerte, yo seré fuerte,” he told her. “I’ll be strong if you are.”

Lawyers for Kilmar Garcia claim he has no criminal record and that he was deported without due process. Garcia was on a flight of alleged Tren de Aragua gang members sent by the Trump administration to El Salvador despite a federal judge’s order to stop them.

Garcia is himself an El Salvador native who, according to court filings, left the country in 2006 after being victim to gang violence. In 2019 he was granted legal protection to stay in the United States after a judge ruled that sending him back to El Salvador would likely result in Abrego Garcia’s persecution by gangs there.

Sura realized her husband was sent to El Salvador’s notorious CECOT mega prison based on his identifiable tattoos that she saw in a photo of prisoners (whose faces are not visible).

Federal officials maintain that Garcia is a danger to the community because of alleged gang ties but have so far not produced any evidence backing those claims.

“They admit they had no legal authorization to remove him to El Salvador,” Abrego Garcia’s attorney Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg told the judge during Friday’s hearing. “The public interest lies in the government following the law.”

Xinis gave the government a deadline of Monday April 7 11:59 p.m. to bring Abrego Garcia back to the United States.

NPR contributed to this report.