Geoff Mulvihill
2026-02-01 19:49:00
Geoff Mulvihill
Updated ,first published
A five-year-old boy and his father have been released from a Texas ICE facility, where they were held after being detained by immigration officers in Minnesota, following a judge’s order that harshly criticised the Trump administration’s approach to enforcement.
Images of Liam Conejo Ramos – with a bunny hat and Spider-Man backpack being surrounded by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in the Minneapolis suburb of Columbia Heights on January 20 – sparked further outcry over the administration’s immigration crackdown in the state.
They were taken to a detention centre more than 1500 kilometres away in Dilley, Texas – triggering a protest outside the facility and a visit by two Democratic members of Congress.
The boy and his father – Adrian Conejo Arias, who is originally from Ecuador – have now been freed and returned to Minnesota, according to Texas Representative Joaquin Castro.
Katherine Schneider, a spokesperson for the Democratic congressman, confirmed the two had arrived home. She said Castro picked them up from Dilley, Texas, on Saturday night and escorted them home to Minnesota.
District Judge Fred Biery, who was appointed by former Democratic president Bill Clinton, said in his ruling that “the case has its genesis in the ill-conceived and incompetently implemented government pursuit of daily deportation quotas, apparently even if it requires traumatising children”.
In his three-page order, he likened the Trump administration’s behaviour to that of the British king decried in the US Declaration of Independence, including sending “Swarms of Officers to harass our People,” exciting “domestic Insurrection among us” and “quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us”.
Biery cited the Constitution’s requirement that an arrest warrant must be based on a judge finding probable cause of a crime. The use of “administrative warrants”, issued by immigration officials, “is called the fox guarding the henhouse”, he wrote.
“Observing human behaviour 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,” Biery wrote. “And the rule of law be damned.”
Biery had previously ruled that the boy and his father could not be immediately removed from the US.
In a statement, US Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said ICE did not target or arrest Liam and that his “alleged mother” refused to take him after his father’s apprehension. His father told officers he wanted Liam to be with him, she said.
“The Trump administration is committed to restoring the rule of law and common sense to our immigration system, and will continue to fight for the arrest, detention, and removal of aliens who have no right to be in this country,” McLaughlin said.
The government said the boy’s father entered the US illegally from Ecuador in December 2024. The family’s lawyer said he has an asylum claim pending that allows him to stay in the US.
Neighbours and school officials say federal immigration officers in Minnesota used the preschooler as “bait” by telling him to knock on the door to his house so that his mother would answer.
The DHS has called that description of events an “abject lie”. It said the father fled on foot and left the boy in a running vehicle in their driveway.
Biery included a photo of Liam in his ruling and references to two lines in the Bible: “Jesus said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these’” , and “Jesus wept”.
Castro wrote a letter to Liam while they were on the plane to Minnesota, in which he told the young boy he has “moved the world”.
“Your family, school and many strangers said prayers for you and offered whatever they could do to see you back home,” Castro wrote. A photo of the letter was posted on social media. “Don’t let anyone tell you this isn’t your home. America became the most powerful, prosperous nation on earth because of immigrants not in spite of them.”
Photos on Castro’s social media showed Liam wearing his blue bunny hat and with a Pikachu backpack.
US Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota, welcomed the boy back to Minnesota, saying in a social media post that he “should be in school and with family – not in detention.” The senator added: “Now ICE needs to leave.”
US Representative Ilhan Omar, also a Democrat from Minnesota, posted a photo to social media of her with Liam, his father and Castro in which she is holding Liam’s Spider-Man backpack. “Welcome home Liam,” she posted with two hearts.
Biery is not the only federal judge who has been tough on ICE recently. A Minnesota-based judge with a conservative pedigree accused the agency of repeatedly violating court orders.
Stephen Miller, the White House chief of staff for policy, has said there’s a target of 3000 immigration arrests a day – a figure the judge described as a “quota”.
The US Department of Justice did not immediately reply to requests for comment.
Detained families have reported poor conditions, including worms in food, fights over clean water and insufficient medical care at the detention centre since its reopening last year. In December, an ICE report acknowledged that 400 children had been held longer than the recommended limit of 20 days.
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