Ensign: In terms of the immediate question of whether flights are leaving, they will not be leaving. Sooknanan: Okay, great. I think the main thing is a representation that the plan is to deplane and then return those kids to where they were prior
Replies
These poor kids are going to be (even more) traumatized than they were before. Absolutely inhumane
aug 31, 2025, 5:40 pm • 12 0 • view
I’m thinks the same. They must be so scared.
aug 31, 2025, 5:40 pm • 5 0 • view
And now we're on recess while Ensign calls his clients.
aug 31, 2025, 5:38 pm • 609 29 • view
6 USC 279, which calls for ORR to help reunite children with a parent abroad in appropriate cases was enacted as part of Homeland Security Act of 2002. 8 USC 1232 is the TVPRA- a later-enacted statute.
aug 31, 2025, 5:55 pm • 4 0 • view
TVPRA requires that UCs from noncontiguous countries “shall” be placed in removal proceedings. If children want voluntary departure there are special protections. Govt essentially claiming a 3rd category of return: “reunification” But no sign of that in law.
aug 31, 2025, 6:00 pm • 7 1 • view
If 6 USC 279 authorizes reunification as DOJ claims that means ORR - which is NOT an immigration enforcement agency but an HHS agency - decides deportations. That’s just a weird read of the two statutory provisions. ORR is not in charge of deporting kids. That’s up to DHS and Immigration Judges.
aug 31, 2025, 7:02 pm • 3 0 • view
Your honor, I spoke with Emil Bove who is still in charge for some reason and he says "fuck you."
aug 31, 2025, 5:42 pm • 195 11 • view
Im surprised Ensign has not been fired yet.
sep 1, 2025, 12:57 pm • 0 0 • view
I need just one court reporter to list him as Punxsuphoney Drew in the record.
aug 31, 2025, 5:49 pm • 5 0 • view
Oh, that brutal cruel son of a bitch.
aug 31, 2025, 5:47 pm • 2 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 6:10 pm • 1 0 • view
We're back. The judge asks if Ensign has an update for her. Ensign: I have confirmed that the plan is to deplane the children and to return them to the custody of Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) Sooknanan asks him to file status report when that's complete
aug 31, 2025, 5:50 pm • 788 87 • view
Does this mean that these children had active asylum cases before this action?
aug 31, 2025, 10:26 pm • 0 0 • view
Sooknanan then says that she had an opportunity during the break to read some of the declarations filed by the named plaintiffs. She wants to read from them because they underscore the conflicting information she's received from the government about the children they want to remove.
aug 31, 2025, 5:51 pm • 1,146 167 • view
Conflicting information
aug 31, 2025, 5:56 pm • 2 0 • view
So his health is still in question,
aug 31, 2025, 5:57 pm • 1 0 • view
The government has argued that the children are simply being reunited with their parents. But Sooknanan reads from a series of declarations that seem inconsistent with that claim.
aug 31, 2025, 5:56 pm • 814 79 • view
This is a classic example of what happens when conservative bad faith bullshit hits the buzzsaw of real life courts and law. Put your kitchen sink away and pick an actual claim of what you say happened and tell it to the judge and prove it
aug 31, 2025, 10:07 pm • 1 0 • view
In one, the child says that her parents [in Guatemala] recently received a strange call from someone with the US government, telling them that he or she would be deported with a larger group of people. "Since my parents told me this news, I feel terrible," the declarant says.
aug 31, 2025, 5:56 pm • 881 95 • view
Is the U.S. a human trafficking facilitator? Is that what's going on? This will stain us all Not just Trumpers.
aug 31, 2025, 6:49 pm • 3 0 • view
People will genuinely wonder why we didn't drop everything we're doing to stop this. They will correctly wonder if we secretly support it, and ask whether distinguishing between support and tolerance matters in the end. Insane.
aug 31, 2025, 6:49 pm • 0 0 • view
Sooknanan: Every one of these 10 children who are named plaintiffs speak about being afraid of going back to Guatemala. She reads a series of quotes in which the children express being afraid of return because they experienced neglect or abuse from one or both of their parents.
aug 31, 2025, 5:58 pm • 937 124 • view
Is this not them? bsky.app/profile/jjin...
aug 31, 2025, 6:00 pm • 22 11 • view
wow, the government is just straight up lying to the judge.
aug 31, 2025, 6:03 pm • 2 0 • view
That seems to be a pattern, but not proven here yet
aug 31, 2025, 6:04 pm • 2 0 • view
To be clear: we have no way of knowing who is on these jets right now. I’m just reporting that these are the 3 planes that I see under ICE Air contract flying to Central America today. There’s also a 767 that has been sitting on the tarmac in South Texas for a couple days now, watching that one 👀
aug 31, 2025, 6:10 pm • 11 1 • view
I don't want to post misinfo, so let me know if I should delete The timing seems odd, but I know there are a *lot* of these flights (because I follow your account. Thanks)
aug 31, 2025, 6:12 pm • 1 0 • view
I appreciate all that you do. Today all we can do is hope that the US is telling the truth via Drew Ensign. And that statement will never fill me with anything I could describe as a “warm fuzzy feeling” but that’s where we are. Again.
aug 31, 2025, 6:12 pm • 1 0 • view
Oh FFS - seriously?
aug 31, 2025, 6:02 pm • 5 0 • view
Not trying to spread misinfo. Just doesn't look good though that this is happening while the court is in session
aug 31, 2025, 6:02 pm • 8 0 • view
It would not shock me if the administration ignored court orders (again)
aug 31, 2025, 6:06 pm • 1 0 • view
Holy moley, I hope not!
aug 31, 2025, 6:02 pm • 1 0 • view
bsky.app/profile/jjin...
aug 31, 2025, 6:08 pm • 1 0 • view
there’s probably other uncontested deportation flights to guatemala going on now, safest assumption is probably that’s what these are
aug 31, 2025, 6:07 pm • 3 0 • view
Why is the US government permitted to commit perjury over and over again without consequences?
aug 31, 2025, 6:08 pm • 9 0 • view
Weasl words . . .
aug 31, 2025, 6:31 pm • 0 0 • view
Anna, thank you for covering this.
aug 31, 2025, 6:03 pm • 7 0 • view
Will the Gov claim they were coached to say this? Thanks, Anna.
aug 31, 2025, 6:05 pm • 2 0 • view
When she's done reading select quotes from the plaintiff's declarations, Judge Sooknanan sums it up as follows: "And so this doesn't quite line up with what I'm hearing from the government.
aug 31, 2025, 6:04 pm • 1,005 189 • view
Would DOJ stretch truth?
aug 31, 2025, 6:05 pm • 2 0 • view
My God! We live in such a world that ten year olds are having to seek counsel and go to law in order to have what are essentially child protection matters fairly processed. What manner of creature in the government wants to conduct a fast clandestine deportation of children at risk?
aug 31, 2025, 6:35 pm • 22 0 • view
Ask Stephen Miller.
aug 31, 2025, 7:24 pm • 10 0 • view
Hmm .. I am not sure my parents brought me up to talk to that sort of creature. As a safety precaution I might insist on meeting on sacred ground, with a font of Holy Water, and a mirror as a backup test.
aug 31, 2025, 7:41 pm • 4 0 • view
Proving yet again that this Administration's immigration roundup was never about combating crime, but about abject cruelty and committing crimes against humanity.
aug 31, 2025, 6:12 pm • 36 8 • view
Jesus…
aug 31, 2025, 8:20 pm • 1 0 • view
Judge Sooknanan is a Real American Shero!💚🔥💚
aug 31, 2025, 8:41 pm • 8 0 • view
She's wise to doubt the truthfulness of Trump's DOJ and the Trumpian defendants.
sep 1, 2025, 12:16 am • 4 0 • view
Judge Sooknanan to Ensign: "This is why we have process. This is why we have courts." Then she says that she also took the opportunity to look at the provision that Ensign cited. "I'm pretty skeptical that it gives the government the authority to do what you are claiming it does," she says.
aug 31, 2025, 6:05 pm • 926 116 • view
Judge Sooknanan: For unaccompanied minors in particular, there are special procedural protections under the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act...that's because this population is incredibly vulnerable. I don't see anything in what you're citing that would override those protections.
aug 31, 2025, 6:07 pm • 977 136 • view
Judge Sooknanan says that she will wait to see Ensign's brief but at this point she's not seeing anything that would displace the statutory protections she just mentioned. Further, she says, I know it's extraordinary to enter a TRO on an ex parte basis. But I felt the situation was imminent...
aug 31, 2025, 6:09 pm • 707 56 • view
Call these MFERs OUT💥💥💥
aug 31, 2025, 6:08 pm • 10 1 • view
They need fodder for their kiddie porn
aug 31, 2025, 6:12 pm • 0 0 • view
i'd say Ensign should be happy working from a holding cell for the next five days.
aug 31, 2025, 7:02 pm • 6 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 8:04 pm • 0 0 • view
Aw we s we w ewssdswsxsgxs
aug 31, 2025, 6:55 pm • 0 0 • view
I hope this isn't those children. Anyone know how to find out?
aug 31, 2025, 6:27 pm • 8 0 • view
Sickening. Those poor children. What is wrong with the Trump administration? Maybe Melania should write a letter to her husband? Wtf?!
sep 1, 2025, 12:02 am • 0 0 • view
What are the realistic odds that Judge Sooknanan will levy a charge of contempt on the DOJ’s counsel for lying to the Court?
aug 31, 2025, 7:00 pm • 3 0 • view
OMG this admin is beyond horrible to do this to children. They’re monsters. Evil to the core.
sep 1, 2025, 12:01 pm • 1 0 • view
It's not the party of family values. It's the party of family abuse.
aug 31, 2025, 8:32 pm • 1 0 • view
"This doesn't quite line up" is a polite way to say "You are lying." As the conflicting depositions were entered under oath, should they turn out to be false*, will those who entered them be charged with perjury or at least held in contempt? (Spoiler:No.) *Should the sun rise in the East.
aug 31, 2025, 7:24 pm • 9 0 • view
Orange is the new black www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-HY...
aug 31, 2025, 7:23 pm • 2 0 • view
That’s easy to resolve. The government is lying.
aug 31, 2025, 6:17 pm • 6 0 • view
Thank you for doing this.
aug 31, 2025, 5:59 pm • 8 0 • view
Gov’t engages in child trafficking.
aug 31, 2025, 6:11 pm • 4 0 • view
The octogenarian toddler in the Oval Office is playing to his strengths . . . Thiry years of partnership with Epstein and Maxwell is a solid basis for his "expertise."
aug 31, 2025, 6:30 pm • 1 0 • view
I doubt he has any idea as to what’s going on here. Stephen Miller has been given free rein over “immigration policy”. Trump stays busy by cheating at golf.
aug 31, 2025, 6:38 pm • 0 0 • view
The human trafficking mob is happy though. Every county in Oklahoma is happy Wake up 26 is coming vote them all out
aug 31, 2025, 6:02 pm • 4 0 • view
Am I crazy or does this sound nothing like “parents are requesting to have their children returned”?
aug 31, 2025, 6:00 pm • 11 0 • view
It’s terrible how a benign agency such as DHS, should have their actions and motivations so misunderstood, twisted, traduced, and embroidered upon -and that’s just by the DOJ. “It is so unfair - every one treats us as if we shoot puppies”
aug 31, 2025, 6:02 pm • 5 1 • view
🤣🤣🤣
aug 31, 2025, 6:09 pm • 0 0 • view
This is so fucking gross. 🤬🤬🤬
aug 31, 2025, 5:57 pm • 28 0 • view
Many thanks for your reporting. Knowing that this is a gov't one cannot trust to tell the time tells me all I need. They make a mockery of democracy.
sep 1, 2025, 2:15 am • 0 0 • view
Trump is deporting children. Impeach. @aclu.org @acluwa.bsky.social @eliaslawgroup.bsky.social @immigrantjustice.bsky.social @legaldefensefund.bsky.social @democracydocket.com @schiff.senate.gov @raskin.house.gov @nadler.house.gov @aoc.bsky.social @petebuttigieg.bsky.social @sanders.senate.gov
aug 31, 2025, 6:32 pm • 2 0 • view
We can't build the gallows fast enough for these people
aug 31, 2025, 10:17 pm • 2 0 • view
Has America lost all sense of f'ing decency? We deserve to be a pariah nation if this evilness continues. Just heartsick as I look at the 10 y/o grandchild sitting across the table from me.
aug 31, 2025, 5:59 pm • 17 2 • view
@marisakabas.bsky.social there’s a big, big story here. Someone in the government is allegedly coercing people to make false declarations in court to violate laws meant to stop child trafficking.
aug 31, 2025, 8:27 pm • 5 0 • view
Oh, I bet.
aug 31, 2025, 5:57 pm • 0 0 • view
Receipts time!!!
aug 31, 2025, 5:52 pm • 5 0 • view
Conflicting information? The government is a de facto authoritarian state that lies, cheats and steals as a matter of policy. It is not to be trusted with the most simplistic representation. It is to be held accountable from A-to-Z with utmost scrutiny. It must be resoundingly defeated.
aug 31, 2025, 8:22 pm • 2 1 • view
Can't they be sanctioned for lying in these statements?
aug 31, 2025, 9:15 pm • 1 0 • view
A Judge with some 🏀🏀👍
aug 31, 2025, 6:26 pm • 4 0 • view
My refresh button is breaking
aug 31, 2025, 5:54 pm • 13 0 • view
Sounds like it is going to be a scorcher.
aug 31, 2025, 5:53 pm • 11 0 • view
Does anyone know where these planes are about to take off from? Florida? TX?
aug 31, 2025, 5:57 pm • 5 0 • view
Removing children is something a certain someone did back in the 1930's... seems history repeats. And someone has been reading the wrong books, learning history incorrectly. www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=...
aug 31, 2025, 6:01 pm • 10 5 • view
Conflicts with the lies the DOJ is telling about them.
aug 31, 2025, 5:59 pm • 4 0 • view
Just assume the DOJ is committing perjury. It simplifies the judicial process.
aug 31, 2025, 6:34 pm • 6 0 • view
Who's going to jail for loading them on the plane ?????????
aug 31, 2025, 5:57 pm • 5 0 • view
The importance of Biden's appointment of, and the Senate's confirmation of (albeit by the slimmest of margins), federal judges cannot be overstated.
aug 31, 2025, 9:16 pm • 3 1 • view
Thank you for this reporting
aug 31, 2025, 5:51 pm • 8 0 • view
Pause and recognize that this implies that the Felon47 Administration is "resettling" Christian children to Guatemala. Where is the Talibangelical outrage on this? Also, "resettling" was to help these kids settle in America and NOT be human-trafficked to foreign death camps.
aug 31, 2025, 6:08 pm • 0 0 • view
Thank you for following this for us and at some point we need to celebrate the people who are watching this closely enough that they can call a judge at 2 AM to stop it.
aug 31, 2025, 6:05 pm • 3 0 • view
When I said to my son that the government now claims that the plan now is to deplane the children his eyebrows went up as he asked "Where?"
aug 31, 2025, 5:55 pm • 10 0 • view
Where? To whom?
aug 31, 2025, 5:57 pm • 2 0 • view
“Plans” change.
aug 31, 2025, 6:16 pm • 0 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 5:39 pm • 25 0 • view
Countdown until Ensign reports all the children being human-trafficked by the Administration are in the air.
aug 31, 2025, 5:47 pm • 15 0 • view
Anyone want to guess who the "client" is when he makes the phone call? My guess is that it's someone on a team of outside lawyers (not DOJ) that have been behind the scenes from the beginning. Deplane the kids, and do not say that you have to ask your clients where the kids will be taken and kept.
aug 31, 2025, 5:50 pm • 4 0 • view
It's no doubt Miller and Blondi.
aug 31, 2025, 7:05 pm • 1 0 • view
Ensign is such a stooge.
aug 31, 2025, 5:41 pm • 8 0 • view
Special place in hell for him one day. Special place in prison for him sooner.
sep 1, 2025, 12:01 am • 0 0 • view
Thanks for all you coverage, Anna. Can you explain why the judge doesn't just have Ensign's client speak directly to the court?
aug 31, 2025, 5:46 pm • 9 0 • view
Deniability. They would have to called as a witness and sworn. No one would be willing to do that.
aug 31, 2025, 5:48 pm • 5 0 • view
When he says "that's my understanding," that's when you know that the reality is the opposite
aug 31, 2025, 5:45 pm • 18 0 • view
And everyone (including the judge) knows that. The atty says that knowing full well that it’s a lie.
aug 31, 2025, 5:49 pm • 1 0 • view
“That’s what I’ve been dispatched to tell you I believe, but they do whatever the fuck they want. Especially when it comes to children.”
aug 31, 2025, 5:54 pm • 11 0 • view
@tomcartwright.bsky.social where are these planes?
aug 31, 2025, 5:40 pm • 1 0 • view
aug 31, 2025, 5:39 pm • 0 0 • view
Pardon if none of us believe a word that comes out of any govt attorney’s mouth related to flights
aug 31, 2025, 5:41 pm • 9 0 • view
Particularly when that mouth belongs to Drew Ensign.
aug 31, 2025, 7:19 pm • 2 0 • view
Thanks for your invaluable reporting work!!!!
aug 31, 2025, 8:25 pm • 0 0 • view
Wtf were those kids.. Find these kids now
aug 31, 2025, 7:52 pm • 1 0 • view
Didn't think I could get more shocked by the U.S., but large-scale child trafficking has me speechless.
aug 31, 2025, 7:28 pm • 0 0 • view