ImmDef Condemns the Trump Administration’s Attempted Illegal Deportation of Guatemalan Children

Immigrant Defenders Law Center (ImmDef) Condemns the Trump Administration’s Attempted Illegal Deportation of Guatemalan Children 

The following statement can be attributed to President & CEO Lindsay Toczylowski of ImmDef:  

“On August 31, 2025, in the dead of night and with just a couple of hours' notice, the Trump administration attempted to illegally deport over 180 Guatemalan children – ripping them from their beds in shelters and foster homes, loading them into vans, and rushing them to airports for deportation flights. These children have not had their day in court. Many of them have expressed fear of returning to Guatemala because of violence, abuse, neglect or human trafficking. All of them have a right to pursue legal relief and seek safety in the United States, but unsurprisingly the Trump administration finds those constitutional and statutory rights inconvenient to their ruthless efforts to force immigrants out.  

What unfolded last night mirrors the disappearance of 152 Venezuelans to the CECOT torture prison in El Salvador. The Trump administration is once again illegally attempting to disappear people – this time children in government custody, alone and without guardians to protect them – and hoping to get away with it under the cover of darkness before a court intervenes. We are grateful to our colleagues at the National Immigration Law Center (NILC) and partners like the Children’s Law Center of Chicago, Florence Immigrant & Refugee Rights Project (FIRRP) and many other organizations across the country who prioritized justice for immigrant children over sleep this Labor Day weekend to stop this abuse of power literally as the government taxied the planes for takeoff. (Orders) 

We are deeply concerned that the government is attempting to circumvent the law and forcibly return vulnerable children to danger - and, in some cases, their deaths. These children are not political pawns; they are human beings. As an immigration lawyer and as a mother, my heart aches to see this cruel and vicious violation of their rights by the administration. This is a textbook example of the Trump administration attacking the most vulnerable among us.  

These illegal deportations were intentionally orchestrated while most Americans were sleeping on a holiday weekend, in a calculated effort to conceal the administration’s acts of lawlessness and cruelty. This brazen mockery of our justice system should jolt all Americans of good conscience awake and galvanize them to take action to protect those who can’t protect themselves.”