Salvadorian migrant Kilmar Abrego Garcia is back in federal court in Tennessee, where a federal judge on Wednesday will hear an appeal from the Justice Department seeking to keep him detained in criminal custody pending trial.

The request to U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw from the Justice Department caps off months of confusing and contradictory statements from the Trump administration in the case of Abrego Garcia, who was erroneously deported to El Salvador in March in violation of a court order, and returned to the U.S. three months later in June.

The acting U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee, Robert McGuire, urged Crenshaw in a new filing this week to keep Abrego Garcia detained in criminal custody pending trial, arguing in a filing that "there is no combination of bail conditions that can reasonably assure either the safety of the community or the defendant’s appearance in future court proceedings."

ABREGO GARCIA LAWYERS ASK US JUDGE TO ORDER RETURN TO MARYLAND AMID ONGOING CRIMINAL CASE

But even that filing highlights the Justice Department’s conflicting statements about its plans for Abrego Garcia, whose case is at the center of two high-profile hearings in Maryland and Tennessee.

After months of delay, the Trump administration returned Abrego Garcia to the U.S., where he was immediately slapped with a newly unsealed federal indictment charging him with crimes stemming from a 2022 traffic stop in Tennessee. 

Abrego Garcia pleaded not guilty to those charges, and was ordered released pending trial by U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes.

Holmes later amended her order to allow Abrego Garcia to be kept in federal custody at the request of his own legal team. His lawyers cited concerns that ICE would immediately take him into immigration custody and deport him to a third country upon his release.

Senior Justice Department officials and ICE officials conceded to this plan last week, telling U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis in Maryland that the government would immediately begin removal proceedings to deport Abrego Garcia to a third country, regardless of the status of his criminal case. In doing so, they broke with previous assertions from U.S. officials, including Attorney General Pam Bondi, who vowed when he was returned that he would remain in U.S. custody for the duration of his trial and any prison time.

SUPREME COURT GRANTS TRUMP REQUEST TO LIFT STAY HALTING VENEZUELAN DEPORTATIONS

Asked by Judge Xinis last week whether the government planned to hold Abrego Garcia in ICE custody until his criminal case in Tennessee is over, lawyers for the administration did not mince their words.

"No," Justice Department attorney Jonathan Guynn answered simply. 

"There’s no intention to just put him in limbo in ICE custody while we wait for the criminal case to unfold," Guynn told Xinis. "He will be removed, as would any other illegal alien in that process."

Abrego Garcia’s second detention hearing in Tennessee comes after his legal team asked a federal judge in Maryland last week to impose sanctions on the Trump administration for the administration’s "egregious" and "repeated violations" of discovery obligations, according to the filing. 

FEDERAL JUDGE ORDERS RETURN OF DEPORTED MIGRANT TO US, REJECTING TRUMP REQUEST

Xinis also pressed Justice Department officials for details as to when they opened a federal investigation into Abrego Garcia in a separate district in Tennessee, and how the timing of the investigation and federal indictment squared with the government's testimony in her own court. 

She noted that, by the government’s own admission, it began investigating Abrego Garcia in the Middle District of Tennessee on April 28, 2025 — the same time officials were telling the court that the administration was powerless to order a foreign government to return him, in compliance with the court order.

"At the same time that [the government] was saying it had ‘no power to produce’" Abrego Garcia in the U.S., Trump administration officials had "already secured an indictment against him in the Middle District of Tennessee, right?" Xinis asked Justice Department lawyer Bridget O'Hickey.

"Yes your honor," O’Hickey replied. 

An incredulous Xinis noted that, just six days later, the government testified they had no power to bring him back to the U.S. "Now I have real concerns — as if I haven't for the last three months," Xinis noted in response.

"Given the series of unlawful actions" here, I feel like it’s well within my authority to order this hearing — perhaps more than one — to hear testimony from at least one witness with firsthand knowledge, who can answer these questions about the immediate next steps" from the government pending Abrego Garca's release from custody, she said.

The joint operations between China and Russia combined with threats coming from North Korea pose the greatest threat to global order since World War II, Japan’s defense ministry said in a new document. 

"The existing order of world peace is being seriously challenged, and Japan finds itself in the most severe and complex security environment of the post-war era," Defense Minister Gen Nakatani said in the annual document. "The international society is in a new crisis era as it faces the biggest challenges since the end of World War II."

The world’s greatest threats are centered in the Indo-Pacific, where Japan is located, and are expected to get worse in coming years, he added.

And amid questions about what role Japan would play if war broke out between the U.S. and China over Taiwan, the minister called the U.S. a "key pillar of our national security policy and the cornerstone of peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific region."

PENTAGON PRESSES JAPAN, AUSTRALIA ON ROLE IN POSSIBLE TAIWAN CONFLICT

Jiang Bin, a spokesperson for China’s defense ministry, said Wednesday that Japan was "hyping up the ‘China threat,’ and grossly interfering in China’s internal affairs."

Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby lauded the report as an "important, clear-eyed strategic assessment."

The report also comes days after Japan accused China of risking near-collisions by flying its fighter jets abnormally close to Tokyo’s intelligence-gathering aircraft. China accused Japan of flying near Chinese airspace to spy. 

The presence of Chinese warships off the coast of southwestern Japan has tripled in the last three years, including in waters between Taiwan and the neighboring Japanese island of Yonaguni, the paper said. 

Russia has engaged in joint activities with China involving aircraft and vessels. 

North Korea, meanwhile, poses "an increasingly serious and imminent threat" to Japan’s security, having developed missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads into Japanese territory and intercontinental missiles that could reach the U.S. homeland. 

CHINA ACCUSES HEGSETH OF ESPOUSING 'COLD WAR MENTALITY' FOR LABELING COUNTRY AS A THREAT: 'VILIFIED'

Japan, in return, continues to fortify its southwestern island chains with long-range cruise missiles, including U.S.-made Tomahawks. 

The overall military balance between China and Taiwan is "rapidly tilting in China’s favor," according to the paper, and Taiwan’s defensive capabilities are increasingly outpaced, especially with China’s development of anti-access/area-denial (A2/AD) systems and amphibious capabilities.

"There is growing concern over China’s pursuit of unification through gray-zone military activities," the paper says, referring to incremental intrusion tactics without the launch of full-scale war. 

Japan sees Taiwan’s security as directly tied to its own: Taiwan strait instability could disrupt vital sea lanes for Japan.