Read: Judge tears into feds for 5-year-old's detention
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A protestor holds an anti-ICE sign during a demonstration in Dilley, Texas, on Jan. 28. Photo: Moisés Ávila / AFP via Getty Images
A federal judge on Saturday ordered the release of 5-year-old Liam Ramos and his father from immigration detention in a stunning castigation of the Trump administration's "ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented" deportation campaign.
The big picture: The image of Ramos in his tiny backpack and blue bunny cap sparked mass outrage against the government's federal blitz that turned Minneapolis into a deadly tinderbox.
The latest: U.S. District Judge Fred Biery of the Western District of Texas, a Clinton appointee, said Ramos and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, must be released no later than Tuesday after they were taken from Minneapolis last month.
- Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas) announced in a Sunday morning post that he had escorted the father and son back to Minnesota.
- "Liam is now home," he wrote. "With his hat and his backpack."
What's inside: "The case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatizing children," Biery wrote in his blistering order.
- Biery cited the Declaration of Independence's grievances against King George III — including "swarms of Officers to harass our People" — and wrote: "'We the people' are hearing echoes of that history."
- "Observing human behavior confirms that for some among us, the perfidious lust for unbridled power and the imposition of cruelty in its quest know no bounds and are bereft of human decency," he wrote.
- The three-page order includes a photo of Ramos and cites two Bible verses: Matthew 19:14 ("Let the little children come to me") and John 11:35 ("Jesus wept").
The other side: DHS has maintained it did not target the child or use him as "bait," calling his father an "illegal alien." Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told Axios in a statement after the order that the "facts in this case have NOT changed: ICE did NOT target or arrest a child."
- The family's attorney told CNN that they are originally from Ecuador, presented themselves to officers in December 2024 to apply for asylum and were "following all the established protocols."
- Ramos' school district said the pair were apprehended in their driveway after he was picked up from preschool and that another adult begged officers to let them take the boy. The district says it has had three other students taken by feds.
- DHS said Ramos' mother "refused to accept custody of the child" and that Ramos' father wanted the boy to remain with him.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, when asked Sunday about Biery's argument that administrative warrants issued by the executive "to itself do not pass probable cause muster," said that "to the extent we need to appeal that judge's decision, I promise we will."
- He contended on ABC's "This Week" that there's a "meaningful dispute about whether they had properly applied for asylum."
Zoom in: Biery notes that courts routinely order undocumented people to be deported — "but do so by proper legal procedures."
- He closed by quoting Benjamin Franklin — "A republic, if you can keep it" — and signed off: "With a judicial finger in the constitutional dike."
Read the order below:
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