Headline Roundup • April 28th, 2025
Judge Says 2-Year-Old US Citizen Possibly Deported Without ‘Meaningful Process’
Summary from the AllSides News Team
A federal judge expressed “strong suspicion” that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) may have deported a 2-year-old US citizen without “meaningful process” on Friday.
The Details: The child, identified as VML, was born in Louisiana and detained by officials along with her sister and mother, Jenny Carolina Lopez Villela, during an immigration check-in on April 22, according to the court filing. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said the mother wanted to take her children with her when she was deported to Honduras. An opposition brief from the Department of Justice (DOJ) said VML was lawfully in her mother’s custody and the Constitution was not violated.
For Context: Sunday morning, The Washington Post (Lean Left bias) reported that lawyers said 4-year-old and 7-year-old citizens from another family were also deported on Friday.
Key Quotes: “The Government contends that this is all okay because the mother wishes that the child be deported with her. But the Court doesn’t know that,” the judge wrote. Assistant DHS Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said, “Parents are asked if they want to be removed with their children or ICE will place the children with someone the parent designates. In this case, the parent stated they wanted to be removed with the children.” On Sunday, border czar Tom Homan told CBS News (Lean Left), “No U.S. citizen child was deported. Deported means ordered by an immigration judge.” Homan added, that having a child in the US “is not a get-out-of-jail-free card.”
How the Media Covered It: The story was widely covered by the left and scantily by the right, though outlets like The Washington Times (Lean Right), Epoch Times (Lean Right), and Daily Mail (Right) covered it. Reports that VML was deported broke late Friday into Saturday, and as of early Sunday, coverage is still developing on the alleged deportations of the 4 and 7-year-olds.
Written by the AllSides staff (of humans). Learn more. Support our mission. Suggest an improvement to this summary. Editor's Note: This summary was updated on April 28 to reflect the Trump administration's denial of the report.
Featured Coverage of this Story
Politico
David Dee Delgado/Getty Images
A federal judge is raising alarms that the Trump administration deported a two-year-old U.S. citizen to Honduras with “no meaningful process,” even as the child’s father was frantically petitioning the courts to keep her in the country.
U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty, a Trump appointee, said the child — identified in court papers by the initials “V.M.L.” — appeared to have been released in Honduras earlier Friday, along with her Honduran-born mother and sister, who had been detained by immigration officials earlier in the week.
BBC News
BBC News
A federal judge has said that a two-year-old US citizen may have been deported to Honduras with her mother and 11-year-old sister without due process, amid the Trump administration's drive to ramp up deportations.
In a court filing, Judge Terry Doughty said that there was "strong suspicion" that the child - identified only as VML - was deported "with no meaningful process".
The Louisiana-born child and her family members were apprehended during a routine appointment at a New Orleans immigration office on 22 April, according to the document.
A spokesperson...
Washington Times
Washington Times
A federal judge bashed the Trump administration Friday for what he said may have been the deportation of a 2-year-old U.S. citizen.
Judge Terry Doughty, a Trump appointee to the court in Louisiana, said he had a “strong suspicion that the government just deported a U.S. citizen with no meaningful process.”
The case touches on a thorny area of deportation in which parental rights clash with those of U.S. citizen children.
