A U.S. federal judge extended until Tuesday, September 16, an order preventing the Donald Trump Administration from deporting a group of hundreds of unaccompanied minors in the custody of authorities to Guatemala.
“It is ordered that the temporary restraining order entered on August 31 at 12:37 p.m. is extended until September 16, 2025. Defendants (the authorities) remain under the same obligations until then,” Judge Timothy James Kelly of the District Court for the District of Columbia established this Saturday, September 13.
Judge extends order that prevents deportation of Guatemalan children
U.S. authorities intended to deport 76 minors already on a plane to Guatemala in August, in addition to a total of 327 Guatemalan children “eligible for reunification with their parents or family” in the Central American country, according to court documents.
But lawyers for the children and adolescents, ages 10 to 16, argued that the Administration violated due process, as they have cases pending before immigration courts, and ignored special protections for the minors, who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border alone.
“To be clear: defendants are ordered not to transfer, repatriate, remove or facilitate the transportation of any of the plaintiffs or members of said putative class from the United States,” now emphasized the order of the judge, who asked for more time to analyze the substantive issue.
In response to this situation, Guatemala’s President Bernardo Arevalo announced on September 1 that his government is prepared to receive up to 150 unaccompanied minors from the United States each week.
The United States had 2,011 unaccompanied minors in custody in August, according to data from the Office of the Administration for Children and Families, part of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), although it does not detail their nationalities.
The repatriation of children has posed a challenge to the Trump Administration because of the Flores Agreement, which was signed in 1997 and states that federal authorities cannot hold undocumented minors in detention centers for more than 20 days and they must be guaranteed their safety and well-being.
With information from EFE
