A federal judge has blocked Donald Trump’s administration from immediately deporting a five-year-old boy and his father after a viral image of their detention brought fresh anger to sweeping immigration enforcement actions in Minnesota.
Preschooler Liam Conejo Ramos was taken into federal custody from the driveway of his family’s home last week after officers arrested his father Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias. They were sent to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Texas.
A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked “any possible or anticipated removal or transfer” of the boy and his father, who brought a lawsuit against the Trump administration to secure his release, according to court filings.
The now-viral image of five-year-old Liam standing in the snow during his father’s arrest is fueling outrage in a city that has emerged as the latest backdrop to Trump’s mass deportation efforts, which have drawn several lawsuits and demonstrations across the country.
Minneapolis schools and families are also reeling after a wave of recent child detentions. Several students from the Columbia Heights Public Schools system were detained by immigration officers within the last week alone, according to the district.
The boy and his father are originally from Ecuador and seeking asylum in the United States.
“These are not illegal aliens. They came legally and are pursuing a legal pathway,” family attorney Marc Prokosch said at a briefing last week.
Vice President JD Vance and Homeland Security officials said they had no choice but to detain the boy and his father, claiming that the boy’s mother “refused to take custody of her child.”
This is a developing story
