Vice President JD Vance is debunking an establishment media claim, circulated repeatedly by Democrats online, that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested a five-year-old boy in Minnesota this week.
The claim went viral after Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) posted a local news article wherein Columbia Heights Public Schools Superintendent Zena Stenvik suggested ICE took custody of a five-year-old boy who was being driven to school by his illegal alien father.
“ICE just detained a 5-year-old child. Don’t tell us this is about ‘the worst of the worst.’ That’s a lie. Absolutely vile,” Omar wrote in the post.
In reality, ICE agents said they had no choice but to stay with the five-year-old boy, identified as Liam Ramos, after his illegal alien father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, took off without him when agents approached Arias’s vehicle.
“On January 20, ICE conducted a targeted operation to arrest Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias an illegal alien from Ecuador who was released into the U.S. by the Biden administration,” Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials detailed:
As agents approached the driver Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, fled on foot—abandoning his child. For the child’s safety, one of our ICE officers remained with the child while the other officers apprehended Conejo Arias. Parents are asked if they want to be removed with their children, or ICE will place the children with a safe person the parent designates. This is consistent with past administration’s immigration enforcement. Parents can take control of their departure and receive a free flight and $2,600 with the CBP Home app. By using the CBP Home app illegal aliens reserve the chance to come back the right legal way. [Emphasis added]
On Thursday, during a press conference in Minneapolis, Vance debunked the media claim that suggests ICE arrested Liam Ramos rather than staying with him while agents pursued his father:
I do a little bit more follow-up research, and what I find is that the five-year-old was not arrested, that his dad was an illegal alien, and when they went to arrest his illegal alien father, the father ran. So the story is that ICE detained a five-year-old, well, what are they supposed to do? Are they supposed to let a 5-year-old child freeze to death?
“If the argument is that you can’t arrest people who’ve violated the laws because they have children, then every single parent is going to be given complete immunity from ever being a subject of law enforcement,” Vance said. “That doesn’t make any sense. No one thinks that makes any sense.”
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.
