Chaotic showdown over Guatemalan children exposes fault lines in Trump’s deportation push
September 4, 2025
A reconstruction of the aborted deportation of dozens of Guatemalan children on Labor Day weekend illuminates the latest clash between the administration’s desire for mass deportations and longstanding legal protections for migrants. A middle-of-the-night call to a judge allowed attorneys to block the flights for two weeks, but the episode has raised questions about how truthful the administration was in its initial accounts. A Guatemalan government report obtained by The Associated Press says that investigators found families for 115 children, nearly all who said they wanted their children to remain in the U.S. or refused to cooperate with investigators. That undercuts the administration’s account.