Five-year-old boy detained by ICE returns home
Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos and his father returned to their home in Minneapolis after being detained by US immigration officials and held in a detention facility in Texas.
A federal judge on Saturday ordered the release of Adrian Conejo Arias and his son, who were detained by immigration officers during the Minnesota raid.
U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro, a Democrat from Texas, wrote in a social media post that he picked them up from the detention center Saturday night and accompanied them to Minnesota on Sunday.
“Liam is home now. With his hat and backpack,” Castro said.
“We won’t stop until all children and families are home.”
A photo that went viral last month shows Liam wearing a blue bunny hat outside his home with federal agents standing nearby.
He was one of four students detained by immigration authorities in a suburb of Minneapolis, according to the Columbia Heights Public School District.
The Ecuadorian boy and his father, who had legally applied for asylum in the United States, were being held in a detention facility in Dilley, Texas.
U.S. District Judge Fred Biery wrote in his ruling Saturday that the origin of the case was “the government’s pursuit and inept enforcement of daily deportation quotas, even when this apparently involved traumatizing children.”
Biery cited the Constitution’s requirement that “an arrest warrant must be based on a judge finding probable cause for a crime.” The use of “administrative permits” issued by immigration officials “is called the fox guarding the chicken coop,” he wrote.
Democrats called for reform following large-scale enforcement operations in Minnesota and other states and two fatal shootings of U.S. citizens involving ICE agents in Minneapolis.
Democratic lawmakers’ demands include mandatory body cameras, an end to roving patrols and a halt to the use of face masks.
While Republicans and Democrats continue negotiations on the DHS bill, funding for the Department of Homeland Security has been halted.
“We’ll be talking about it in the near future,” President Donald Trump told reporters Sunday at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida.
