On Jan. 20, five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents alongside his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, while they were on their way back home from school in Columbia Heights, Minn.
To many, this was confusing and sad. To all, this should be enraging.
Ramos’ family had legally emigrated from Ecuador in 2024 with political asylum. There was no order of deportation issued to seize the father and son and there were no crimes that anyone from the family was charged with, including the five-year-old boy.
After the two were taken into custody, Ramos’ classmates wrote letters to ICE. These children wrote of respect, kindness and mercy; three themes that ICE has not deemed particularly necessary in their line of work.
The New York Times published a video of the children who wrote these letters reading their words. In the video, it was said that almost 20% of students are learning virtually because they fear being unable to go home while they sit at their desks, as shown in the video uploaded by the New York Times.
The halls of Valley View Elementary School in Minnesota are filled with paper bags that carry various household necessities, as shown in the video posted by the New York Times. The bags had items such as food and hygiene products, meant for those who are afraid to leave their homes.
I am heartbroken for what America looks like today. There are millions of people being targeted for nothing more than their skin tone, who are being extracted from their daily routines without warrants, criminal charges or reason. Many of the people detained are yelling that they have the documentation necessary to prove they are where they belong, that they are not the criminals they are looking for.
It is one thing when it is truly violent individuals with proof of their crimes, after going through due process and the American right of “innocent until proven guilty.” It is another entirely when they are mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, teachers, hard workers… Unfortunately, they all seem to fall under the same umbrella.
“You are scaring schools, people and the world,” one little girl wrote. “You should be kind, careful and caring, like normal police. Not dangerous, scary and stealing people.”
I want to be clear on what this criticism is and what it is not. I am not arguing that law enforcement in itself is bad. In fact, the titles of “police officers” and “ICE agents” are not at all synonymous. When officers follow the law, uphold their oath and genuinely work to protect and serve, they can and should be respected pillars of their communities.
The problem arises when that mission is abandoned, when law enforcement becomes detached from accountability, transparency and basic empathy. Criticizing ICE is not an attack on all law enforcement; it is a demand that those entrusted with power be held to the same standards they are sworn to uphold.
Alas, true accountability is hard to obtain when the government leaders that ICE agents work for are not working to protect the citizens, but fuel power, greed and fear.
As of Feb. 2, Liam Ramos and his father have been released from the detention facility in Texas, where they were held. They were given the freedom to go back home, along with the Department of Homeland Security’s official statement, “ICE did NOT target or arrest a child.”
While this may seem like a situation that is out of our hands, there are things that we can do in hopes of change. Call your state representatives. Participate in lawful and peaceful protests that prove our patriotism and wish for change. Keep documentation of any interactions you may witness. Demand for reallocated funding to ICE to ensure ethical and careful training; owning and using a gun is an incredibly delicate responsibility, one that can be fatal.
Thankfully, Liam Ramos and his father are home. Sadly, there are still countless children, families and individuals being held in these detention facilities, the majority of whom have done nothing wrong, including having the legal and constitutional right to be in America, “The Land of the Free.”
