• A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration from deporting Guatemalan unaccompanied minors.
• Judge Timothy Kelly criticized the administration's justification for deportations as lacking evidence.
• The ruling follows an emergency attempt to deport over 70 children during Labor Day weekend.
• Parents of these children reportedly did not wish for their return to Guatemala.
• This ruling may impact similar deportation cases involving minors from other countries.

A federal judge on Thursday issued a preliminary injunction preventing the Trump administration from deporting Guatemalan unaccompanied minors, stating that the government's claims about parental consent "crumbled like a house of cards." U.S. District Judge Timothy Kelly criticized the administration's assertion that it was acting to reunify families, citing a lack of evidence to support this rationale, especially considering many parents could not be located or did not want their children returned to Guatemala. The ruling followed an emergency deportation attempt over Labor Day weekend that involved more than 70 children being prepared for immediate removal while their cases remained unresolved, according to LA Times, Newsweek, and Reuters.

Judge Kelly, appointed by President Trump, reiterated the urgency of the situation in his ruling, which blocks deportations until the legal challenge is resolved. The administration's effort on August 31 led to an emergency court filing just hours before children were set to board planes to Guatemala. Kelly pointed out that the children were taken from their shelters late at night without proper notice, causing distress among the minors; he wrote about a young girl who was so frightened during the abrupt proceedings that she vomited, as noted in reports from CBS News and ABC News.

The judge's ruling also indicated that the administration's claims regarding parental cooperation were baseless; reports revealed that very few parents wished for their children to be returned. Guatemalan authorities mentioned they could not reach most parents of the 600 children potentially affected, and many who were contacted expressed a desire for their children to remain in the U.S. Both parents and advocates have voiced concerns that the administration's action was an overreach lacking due process, as highlighted by statements in Al Jazeera and Reuters.

In his ruling, Kelly mandated that unaccompanied children with active immigration cases cannot be deported unless they have received a final order for removal or obtained permission from the U.S. attorney general. The implications of this ruling could extend beyond Guatemalan children, possibly affecting minors from other Central American nations facing similar deportation efforts, as indicated by legal service providers, which have raised alarms about potential actions against children from Honduras and El Salvador, as reported by ABC News and CBS News.