A canister of pepper spray launched by Texas troopers flies in the direction of protesters exterior the South Texas Household Residential Heart detention facility the place Liam Ramos and his father are being detained in Dilley, Texas, Wednesday, Jan. 28, 2026.
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Eric Homosexual/AP
SAN ANTONIO — A decide on Saturday ordered the U.S. authorities to launch by Tuesday a 5-year-old boy and his father from a Texas detention middle the place they have been taken after being detained by immigration officers in a Minneapolis suburb final month.
Pictures of Liam Conejo Ramos, with a bunny hat and Spiderman backpack being surrounded by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Officers, sparked much more outcry about President Trump’s administration’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota. It additionally led to a protest on the household detention middle and a go to by two Texas Democratic members of Congress.
U.S. District Decide Fred Biery, who was appointed by former Democratic President Invoice Clinton, mentioned in his ruling that “the case has its genesis within the ill-conceived and incompetently-implemented authorities pursuit of each day deportation quotas, apparently even when it requires traumatizing kids.”
The identical decide had beforehand dominated that the boy and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, couldn’t be faraway from the U.S., not less than for now.
In his order Saturday, Biery mentioned: “obvious is also the federal government’s ignorance of an American historic doc referred to as the Declaration of Independence,” suggesting the Trump administration’s actions echo those who writer and future President Thomas Jefferson enumerated as grievances in opposition to England.
Biery additionally included in his ruling a photograph of Liam Conejo Ramos and references to 2 traces within the Bible: “Jesus mentioned, ‘Let the little kids come to me, and don’t hinder them, for the dominion of heaven belongs to comparable to these,” and “Jesus Wept.”
An order to launch 5-year-old Liam Ramos and his father from detention, which included an image of the boy and Bible verse references underneath the signature of U.S. District Decide Fred Biery, is photographed Saturday, Jan. 31, 2026.
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Sydney Schaefer/AP
Stephen Miller, the White Home chief of employees for coverage, has mentioned there is a goal of three,000 immigration arrests a day. It is that determine which the decide appeared to explain as a “quota.”
Spokespersons from the U.S. Division of Justice and U.S. Division of Homeland Safety didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
Neighbors and faculty officers say that federal immigration officers in Minnesota used the preschooler as “bait” by telling him to knock on the door to his home in order that his mom would reply. The Division of Homeland Safety has referred to as that description of occasions an “abject lie.” It mentioned the daddy fled on foot and left the boy in a operating automobile of their driveway.
In the course of the Jan. 28 go to with Reps. Joaquin Castro and Jasmine Crockett, the boy slept within the arms of his father, who mentioned Liam was regularly drained and never consuming nicely on the detention facility housing about 1,100 individuals, in accordance with Castro.
Detained households report poor circumstances like worms in meals, preventing for clear water and poor medical care on the detention middle since its reopening final 12 months. In December, a report filed by ICE acknowledged they held about 400 kids longer than the advisable restrict of 20 days.
