School officials said the child, Liam Conejo Ramos, was “essentially” used as a “bait” to arrest his father, who is seeking asylum in the United States.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents detained a 5-year-old boy on his way home from kindergarten in Minnesota after they allegedly used him as a “bait” to arrest his asylum-seeking father.
Columbia Heights Public Schools Superintendent Zena Stenvik said in a news conference Wednesday that federal agents removed Liam Conejo Ramos from a moving vehicle Tuesday afternoon as he was in his family’s driveway.
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Stenvik said the officers instructed the child to knock on the door of the house to see if anyone else was inside, “essentially using the 5-year-old as bait.”
Stenvik said his family came to the United States in 2024, but are currently applying for asylum and have not been ordered to be deported.
“Why would you detain a five-year-old?” she asked. “We cannot say that this child would be classified as a violent offender.”
“ICE does not target children,” Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement.
She said ICE is conducting an operation to arrest the child’s father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, who McLaughlin said is from Ecuador.
“For the child’s safety, one ICE officer remained with the child while the other officer arrested Conejo-Arias,” McLaughlin said, adding that parents were given the option of removing the child or leaving it with someone of their choice.
Liam is the fourth Columbia Heights Public Schools student to be detained by ICE in recent weeks, Stenbic said. She said a 17-year-old student was taken on Tuesday while on her way to school, along with a 10-year-old and a 17-year-old.
The family’s attorney, Mark Prokosch, said Thursday that Liam and his father may have been taken to an immigration detention facility in Dilley, Texas, and held in a family cell.
“We are considering legal options to see if we can release them through some legal means or moral pressure,” he told a news conference.
Lawyers who visited the Dilley detention center last week as part of an ongoing lawsuit seeking greater security for immigrant children in federal custody said conditions were deteriorating.
“The situation has never been worse,” said Lecia Welch, chief legal counsel for the advocacy group Children’s Rights.
“The number of children was rapidly increasing, and a significant number of children were being held for more than 100 days,” Welch said.
“Nearly all of the children we spoke to were sick, and disease appeared to be widespread. Families reported that their children were malnourished, severely ill, and suffering severely from prolonged detention,” Welch said.
Vice President J.D. Vance, who visited Minneapolis on Thursday, said he had heard “horrific stories” about Liam, but said he did not know what else federal officials could have done.
“So what are they supposed to do? Shouldn’t they be freezing 5-year-olds to death? Shouldn’t we be arresting illegal aliens in the United States?” Vance said, noting that he too was the parent of a 5-year-old.
U.S. federal agents have arrested about 3,000 people in immigration raids across Minnesota in recent weeks, said Greg Bovino, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection official.
Julia Decker, policy director at the Minnesota Immigration Law Center, said advocates have no way of knowing whether the government’s account of arrests and people being detained is accurate.
Also Thursday, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced that three people were arrested in Minneapolis after protesting at Cities Church in St. Paul, claiming one of the pastors, David Easterwood, was the acting field director of the St. Paul ICE Field Office. Those arrested included Minneapolis civil rights activist Nekima Levy Armstrong and St. Paul school board member Chauntil Louisa Allen, the Minnesota Star Tribune reported.
In a post on X, Bondi said Armstrong played a “key role” in organizing Sunday’s protests.
