A 5-year-old boy and his father who were taken into custody by ICE during the agency’s illegal immigration crackdown in Minneapolis were freed over the weekend after a federal judge ordered their release.
Liam Conejo Ramos, 5, and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, were released from a US Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention center in Texas on Saturday and returned to Minnesota on Sunday, according to Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro.
Arias, originally from Ecuador, and his young son were detained by ICE at their family home in a Minneapolis suburb on Jan. 20.
A picture of Liam wearing a blue bunny hat and a Spider-Man backpack while he was being taken by federal immigration agents sparked a firestorm of backlash over the Trump administration’s crackdown and immediate calls for his release.
Neighbors and school officials accused the feds of using the preschooler as “bait” by getting him to knock on the family’s door to lure his mother out of their home after Arias tried to flee.
The US Department of Homeland Security repeatedly refuted the claim. DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said ICE didn’t target the boy, claiming his mother refused to take him after his father was apprehended, leaving him in the care of the agents.
He was sent to the same facility as Arias, and the two were held there for nearly two weeks.
“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 in a statement.
The feds said that Arias had entered the country illegally in December 2024. But the family’s attorney argued he had a pending asylum claim allowing him to stay in the US.
US District Judge Fred Biery demanded the pair’s release in a scathing letter on Saturday.
“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 ruling.
Biery previously ruled that Liam and his dad could not be removed from the US.
At the bottom of his order, Biery included the viral photo of Liam being taken by ICE and two Bible verses that read: “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.”
Two other children at Liam’s school in Minneapolis have since been taken by ICE, the New York Times reported.
— With Post wires
