HARLINGEN, Texas (AP) — Laura Peña knew she had two hours to stop the children she represents from being deported home to Guatemala. She and other lawyers and advocates around the country were just starting to get word that Saturday night of Labor Day weekend that migrant children had just been woken up and were heading to the airport.
Hours of confusion ensued, including a frantic phone call to a judge at 2:36 a.m. It was remarkably similar to a chaotic March weekend when the Trump administration deported hundreds of Venezuelans to a maximum-security prison in El Salvador despite frantic attempts by attorneys and an intervention by a judge who came to court on a Saturday night in civilian dress.
This time, the attorneys managed to block the flights, at least for two weeks, but the episode has raised questions about how truthful the administration was in its initial accounts.
A Guatemalan government report obtained by The Associated Press from a U.S.-based human rights group says 50 of 115 families contacted by investigators said they wanted their children to stay in the U.S., undermining a key Trump administration claim that they wanted their children back in Guatemala. Another 59 families wouldn’t allow government teams in their homes, believing that refusing to cooperate would make it more likely their children could remain in the U.S., according to the report.
Many questions remain, including a full rundown of how old the children were and how many the administration planned to remove that night.
While some answers may emerge in court, a reconstruction of the rapid-fire events, based on interviews and government documents, illuminates the latest clash between the administration’s desire for mass deportations and longstanding legal protections for migrants.
Children told to pack a bag
Weeks of quiet planning led to at least 76 children boarding planes at Texas airports in Harlingen and El Paso.
Peña, who represents migrant children at the South Texas Pro Bono Asylum Representation Project, kissed her 3-month-old goodbye and raced to a shelter. While driving, she got calls about children in other shelters being loaded onto buses.
Children were in the lobby with packed bags when she arrived, including one boy who was “almost catatonic,” terrified he would be murdered like a relative back home if he was returned, Peña said.
Three teens living with foster families in the Dallas area got a four-hour notice, said Jennifer Anzardo Valdes, director of children’s legal services at the International Rescue Committee, which represents them. “They all spoke about how they were woken up in the middle of the night and told to pack a bag,” she said.
A judge is jolted awake in the middle of the night
U.S. District Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan of Washington was jolted awake at 2:36 a.m. with an emergency request to stop the flights. The judge said in court Sunday that she left a voicemail for a Justice Department lawyer at 3:33 a.m. She ordered a halt to the deportations at 4:22 a.m.
“I have the government attempting to remove unaccompanied minors from the country in the wee hours of the morning on a holiday weekend, which is surprising,” said Sooknanan, who was appointed during the final weeks of Joe Biden’s presidency. “Absent action by the courts all of those children would have been returned to Guatemala, potentially to very dangerous situations.”
Drew Ensign, a Justice Department attorney, said it was possible that one plane had taken off but returned before the children were deported.
The Trump administration argued that it acted at Guatemala’s behest. White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller accused the judge of “effectively kidnapping these migrant children and refusing to let them return home to their parents in their home country.”
The Guatemalan government report about the children’s families raises serious questions about the administration’s version of events.
One family said if their daughter was returned to Guatemala they would do everything to get her out because her life was threatened, according to the report.
Lucrecia Prera, Guatemala’s child advocate who prepared the report that raises questions about the Trump administration’s claims, told the AP that many families suspected her office was pushing for their children to be returned.
“We want to clarify that we are respectful of and unconnected to the process happening in the United States,” she said. “They are Guatemalan children and our obligation is to protect them.”
The children were led off the planes after hours on the tarmac and returned to their shelters.
A 2008 law requires children appear before an immigration judge
Children began crossing the border alone in large numbers in 2014, peaking at 152,060 in the 2022 fiscal year. July’s arrest tally translates to an annual clip of 5,712 arrests, reflecting how illegal crossings have dropped to their lowest levels in six decades.
Guatemalans accounted for 32% of residents at government-run holding facilities last year, followed by Hondurans, Mexicans and El Salvadorans. A 2008 law requires children to appear before an immigration judge with an opportunity to pursue asylum, unless they are from Canada and Mexico. The vast majority are released from shelters to parents, legal guardians or immediate family while their cases wind through court.
It is unclear how many children who boarded at Texas airports in Harlingen and El Paso over Labor Day weekend — as well as any who were on the way — were allowed their day in court as required by the 2008 law. Lawyers for many of the Guatemalan children in the shelter system have said they still have active cases they want to pursue so they can stay in the U.S.
The Labor Day weekend drama can be traced to July, when Guatemala’s immigration chief said the government planned to bring back 341 children from shelters overseen by the U.S. Health and Human Services Department. They were nearing 18 and Guatemala didn’t want them transferred to immigration detention centers for adults.
But attorneys representing Guatemalan clients said the administration targeted kids young enough to be in elementary school on Sunday and either woke them up from shelters or placed them on a bus heading to the airport, countering the claim that only those close to aging out were targeted.
Valdes, of the International Rescue Committee, said some girls, all teenagers, were on a bus for hours, never actually making it to an airport and eventually being returned to a south Texas shelter.
Lawyers sensed something was afoot heading into the holiday weekend
“We started hearing from legal service providers about strange calls they’d received from some Guatemalan children’s parents or relatives in Guatemala who were told by Guatemalan officials that their children were going to be deported from the U.S.,” said Shaina Aber, executive director of the Acacia Center for Justice.
The children were still in immigration court proceedings, said Aber, whose group runs a network of legal services providers. Guatemalan consulates told lawyers for their children that they made the calls at the request of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, she said.
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, said Friday that as many as 700 Guatemalan children could be sent home. Lawyers who checked electronic court dockets found that future court dates had disappeared.
At the Guatemalan airport Sunday, families prepared for their children’s return. Leslie Lima, from San Marcos in western Guatemala, came to see her 17-year-old son Gabriel four months after he left home and was detained after crossing the border near El Paso. Since the imminent return of the minors was publicized last week, Lima had been worried about Gabriel.
“We will receive him here, but I hope that he can stay (in the U.S.) and accomplish his dreams,” she said.
Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo has said his administration told the U.S. that they’re willing to receive “all unaccompanied minors, who wanted to return to Guatemala voluntarily” and would welcome anyone who is ordered to leave the U.S.
The judge’s order blocking deportation of any Guatemalan children who don’t have final orders of removal expires in 14 days.
Children’s advocates and lawyers believe the chaos isn’t over.
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Santana reported from Washington and Perez reported from Guatemala City. Elliot Spagat contributed from San Diego.
