Vance Refutes Blatant Lie That ICE ‘Detained’ A 5-Year-Old
Vice President J.D. Vance on Thursday pushed back against reports that federal immigration agents detained a 5-year-old Minnesota boy, saying the media had misrepresented what happened and that the child was never the target of an arrest.
“I actually saw this terrible story while I was coming to Minneapolis,” Vance said. “I see this story, and I am a father of a 5-year-old — a 5-year-old little boy — and I think to myself, oh my God, this is terrible. How did we arrest a 5-year-old?”
“Well, I do a little bit more follow-up research,” Vance continued, “and what I find is that the five-year-old was not arrested — that his dad was an illegal alien, and then 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 five-year-old child freeze to death?”
The vice president’s remarks come amid a widening political storm over immigration enforcement in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, where Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has detained at least four students from the local public school district over the past two weeks.
The case that sparked the controversy involves Liam, a 5-year-old preschooler, and his father, who were apprehended Tuesday outside their home. School officials and the family’s attorney claim ICE agents pulled Liam from a running vehicle and used him to gain access to the family’s home.
Zena Stenvik, superintendent of Columbia Heights Public Schools, said another adult at the home “begged” agents to allow them to take custody of the boy, but the agents refused. She alleged that the child was “essentially used as bait.”
Marc Prokosch, an immigration attorney representing the family, said Liam and his father were taken to a federal family detention facility in San Antonio, Texas, and remain in custody.
Prokosch insisted that Liam’s father is not an “illegal alien,” as Vance claimed, but a legal asylum seeker from Ecuador who entered the country using the CBP One app, which allows migrants to schedule appointments to present themselves legally at the border. There have been countless cases of alleged asylum seekers using the CBP One App and then skipping out on court hearings.
“So they did everything right when they came in,” Prokosch claimed at a Thursday press conference. “They used the app, they made an appointment, they came to the border and presented themselves to Customs and Border Patrol. They were following the process. But ICE didn’t care about the fact that they had those pending claims and then just arrested them.”
Prokosch added that “immigration violations are civil in nature,” saying, “You can’t justify incarcerating a child for a civil violation — and that’s not even accurate here, because they entered lawfully through the CBP One program.”
He accused ICE of violating internal DHS policy that limits arrests of children and families without high-level approval. “The family posed no safety threat and showed up for every required hearing,” he said.
Prokosch responded later Thursday, reiterating that the family was lawfully in the country. “Vice President Vance is misinformed,” he said. “This father and child are not ‘illegal aliens.’ They followed every legal step required of them and were still treated like criminals.”
ICE officials declined to comment on the specific case, citing privacy concerns and pending legal proceedings, but said in a statement that its officers “conduct targeted enforcement actions in accordance with federal law and policy” and that “children encountered during enforcement operations are treated with the utmost care.”
As protests continue in the Twin Cities, the asylum system — now being enforced under President Trump and Vice President Vance — faces renewed debate over how to balance compassion with law enforcement.
“You can’t have a country without borders,” Vance said. “You can’t have justice if the law doesn’t apply to everyone.”
