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Prokosch said he could not find any criminal records for Liam's father, Adrian Conejo Ramos, in the Minnesota database. 

An earlier statement from the DHS described Conejo Ramos as "an illegal from Ecuador."

Prokosch pushed back at Vance’s characterization of Liam’s father as an "illegal alien." 

Prokosch said both father and son entered the U.S. At a border crossing in 2024, presented themselves to Customs and Border Protection officials, and applied for asylum. 

"These are not illegal aliens," Prokosch told the news conference. "They came legally and are pursuing a legal pathway."

Stenvik is asked about the Trump administration's characterization that ICE agents detained the five-year-old because his father fled. 

She said she was inside the home to support the mother, who was "distraught," and did not see the father run — but saw him handcuffed in the driveway.

Granlund said she offered to take the child, but cannot recall what agents said back to her. She watched the officers drive away. 

The two women have been describing a fluid situation outside the family home, with people yelling and speaking over one another.

Prokosch said he has not had "direct contact" with Liam's father, but has had "indirect contact." He said he wasn't representing the family before their detention and has been on their case for the past 36 hours or so. 

He said he believes father and son are being detained together, but he can't be 100 per cent sure.

"We've been trying to set up calls with the Dilley [Texas] facility," he said.

Granlund said she witnessed the arrest of Liam and his father on Tuesday because she was picking up her own children from school at the time. 

She said she got out of her car when she heard the "commotion," walked around the corner and heard people saying, "Don't take the child."

"There was ample opportunity to be able to safely hand that child off to adults. Mom was there."

Mary Granlund, school board chair, gets emotional as she speaks about the anxiety she says she has seen in schools.

"At the end of the day, we have whistles and they have guns," she said, repeating a portion of the statement released by Renee Good's widow.

Zena Stenvik, superintendent of Columbia Heights Public Schools, is speaking after Prokosch. 

"Over the last few weeks, I've kept my head down and focused just on supporting our school, our school district, our families, our students or staff. But as of this week, four of our students have been apprehended and taken away by masked and armed ICE agents with no identifying badges. So we decided it was time to speak up and share what's actually going on," she said.

"The onslaught of ICE activity in our community is inducing trauma and is taking a toll on our children, taking a toll on our families, our staff, our community members. This surge has changed nearly everything about our daily lives."

In closing, Prokosch said the scale and speed of the Trump administration's immigration crackdown has led to federal agents in the field without the proper training, oversight or protections in place.

"It raises the likelihood that things are going to go badly," he said.

He added: "We do recognize the need for immigration enforcement, but it must be measured, accountable, proportional, not endangering communities and lawful."

Prokosch said detaining children and families seeking asylum is "inhumane and unacceptable," subjecting parents and children to trauma. He said the Conejo-Ramoses did not violate immigration law, but if they had, immigration violations are a civil matter.

"How can you justify detaining a child because of a civil violation?"

Prokosch, who was a high school teacher before he became an attorney, begins by saying Liam and his dad entered the U.S. Lawfully through a port of entry to seek asylum and the Brownsville border crossing in Texas through the CBP app to escape "persecution from their home country."

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