Judge temporarily blocks U.S. efforts to remove some immigrant Guatemalan and Honduran children

A gavel bangs in the courtroom. (Katrin Bolovtsova/Pexels)

TUCSON, Ariz. — A U.S. federal judge in Arizona temporarily blocked the Trump administration from removing dozens of Guatemalan and Honduran children living in shelters or foster care after coming to the U.S. alone, according to a decision Thursday.

U.S. District Judge Rosemary Marquez in Tucson extended until at least Sept. 26 a temporary restraining issued over the Labor Day weekend. Marquez raised concern over whether the government had arranged for any of the children’s parents or legal guardians in Guatemala to take custody of them.

Laura Belous, attorney for the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project, which represents the children, said in court that the minors expressed no desire to be repatriated to their native countries of Guatemala and Honduras amid concerns they could face neglect, possible child trafficking or hardships associated with individual medical conditions.

Lawyers for the children said their clients fear going home and the government is not following laws designed to protect migrant children.

Belous’ organization filed a lawsuit in Arizona on behalf of 57 Guatemalan children and another 12 from Honduras between the ages 3 and 17.

Trump administration also seeks to deport unaccompanied children from Washington, DC

The suit, along with a related lawsuit before a federal judge in Washington responds to the administration’s Labor Day weekend attempt to remove Guatemalan migrant children who were living in government shelters and foster care after coming to the U.S. alone.

In a late night operation Aug. 30, the administration notified shelters that they would be returning the children to Guatemala and needed to have the kids ready to leave in a matter of hours. Scores of children got as far as boarding planes in Texas on the morning of Aug. 31 and were set to depart to Guatemala.

At Thursday’s hearing in Tucson, Denise Ann Faulk, an assistant U.S. attorney under the Trump administration, emphasized that the child repatriations were negotiated with Guatemala at high diplomatic levels and would avoid lengthy prohibitions on returning to the U.S.

Nearly all the children were in the custody of the U.S. Health and Human Services Department’s Office of Refugee Resettlement and living at shelters in the Phoenix and Tucson areas. Similar lawsuits filed in Illinois and Washington, D.C., seek to stop the government from removing the children.

The Arizona lawsuit demands that the government allow the children their right to present their cases to an immigration judge, to have access to legal counsel and to be placed in the least restrictive setting that is in their best interest.

The Trump administration has argued it is acting in the best interest of the children by trying to reunite them with their families at the behest of the Guatemalan government. After Guatemalan officials toured U.S. detention facilities, the government said that it was “very concerned” and that it would take children who wanted to return voluntarily.

Details reflect shifting immigration patterns

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 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.

The Arizona lawsuit was amended to include 12 children from Honduras who have expressed to an Arizona legal aid group that they do not want to return to Honduras, as well as four additional children from Guatemala who have come into government custody in Arizona since the lawsuit was initially filed on Aug. 30.

Judge Marquez said she found it “frightening” that U.S. officials may not have coordinated with the children’s parents. She also expressed concern that the government was denying the children access to review by an experienced immigration judge, and noted that legal representatives for the children were notified of preparations for child departures with little notice, late at night.

“On a practical matter, it just seems that a lot of these things that (the Office of Refugee Resettlement) has taken upon themselves to do -- such as screening and making judicial determinations that should be made by an immigration judge with expertise and time to meet with a lawyer and meet with a child -- is just surpassed by saying `we’re reuniting them”' with parents, Marquez said in court as she pressed Faulk for more information.

Marquez was appointed as a federal judge in 2014 after being nominated by then-President Barack Obama. In documents related to her confirmation, she listed herself as having volunteered at the Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights project in the early 2000s.

A request for comment from the judge was declined. Chief Deputy Clerk Mags Everette cited restrictions under a code of conduct for judges.

Jacques Billeaud And Morgan Lee, The Associated Press