LEILA FADEL, HOST:
The 5-year-old who captured the nation's attention when he was pictured being led away by federal agents while wearing a bunny hat and a Spider-Man backpack in Minnesota is recovering at home. Liam Conejo Ramos was flown back from a detention center in Texas over the weekend. He was detained when ICE picked up his dad. A judge ordered both of them to be released. The principal of Liam's school, Jason Kuhlman, says he planned to tell Liam's classmates at Valley View Elementary School on Monday morning, the morning we spoke. But the school in a suburb of Minneapolis was closed because of a bomb threat.
JASON KUHLMAN: This was our first as a district wide that we received a threat or a credible threat. There might've been little ones, you know, on our voicemails and stuff like that, but this one was at multiple schools in multiple districts.
FADEL: I'm sorry. You get little ones on your voicemail? That doesn't sound little to me. Like, what have you been getting?
KUHLMAN: Well, there might've - some death threats and then just various, you know, calling us, you know, beautiful language.
FADEL: And is that since you've been speaking publicly about what's been happening at your school?
KUHLMAN: Yes. Yep.
FADEL: Kevin Centeno joined our conversation. He's a full-service community school coordinator in the district. He helps families get the services they need, including Liam's.
KEVIN CENTENO: Once I saw the news that he was supposed to be released, my heart just lifted up in the aspect of joy. You know, if we want our kids to be happy and joy, we can't be putting them in a situation where they're going to be in fear.
FADEL: Now, Liam is not the only student from Valley View Elementary that's been detained. Principal Kuhlman escorted two brothers to their mother after she was picked up when she went to her immigration hearing last week. Unlike Liam, they're still in detention. In our conversation, Principal Kuhlman described rushing to Liam's home just after he was detained on January 20.
What did you find when you got there?
KUHLMAN: A very distraught mom, which, you know, rightfully so. She had to make an impossible decision to not open the door for her 5-year-old as she knew that she had a middle schooler that was still at school. And if she opened that door, I imagine what she was thinking was, now I'm going to get taken, and my older son is going to be left all alone.
FADEL: And you've said that you felt like he was being used to get to the parents.
KUHLMAN: Absolutely. They're going up to knock on that door to see if they can draw Mom out of the house.
FADEL: If you didn't have a bomb threat today, would Liam have been at school?
KUHLMAN: Kevin, I'm going to defer to you 'cause you reach out to Mom more.
CENTENO: Correct. The family has requested to make sure - hey, we want to take it day by day.
FADEL: Yeah.
CENTENO: I've heard from Liam saying that I want to go back to school. I want to be back in school. But realistically...
FADEL: Liam told you that?
CENTENO: Correct. But at the same time, we've got to make sure what Mom and Dad feels, you know...
FADEL: Right.
CENTENO: And respect their decision. You know, he's not ready to be back. We want to make sure he's safe.
FADEL: So you said you did speak to Liam.
CENTENO: Correct.
FADEL: Can you tell me a little bit about that conversation?
CENTENO: Yeah. He's excited. He's glad to be back with Mom. You know, like, what child doesn't want to be back with his own parents? You know, the joy of having Mom there taking care of him and Dad being right next to him, understanding that Mom and Dad love me so much, and I want to be with them.
FADEL: Jason, what is this all doing to the atmosphere at school? These are elementary school kids.
KUHLMAN: I think in school, we're trying to keep it as business as usual. I think it's really important that that predictability, that routine is kept because that's a level of comfort for our students and our teachers. As they're coming in, there's fear. So we're actually giving extra time in the morning for what we call a morning meeting, and it's a way for students to get their voices in the room and also address issues like this.
FADEL: What are some of the things that you've heard in these morning meetings?
KUHLMAN: So for, like, the upper kids, it's just putting it out there. I believe Kevin and I both went into one of the morning meetings in fifth grade, and my question was, how many of you heard of ICE? OK, raise your hands. Now I want you to watch, adults included. How many of you are scared of ICE? And I raised my hand. Kevin raised his hand and the teacher and then a lot of kids. And I said, why is that? And so then kids started talking, and that was a great experience to open up the room for that.
Our youngest learners were working and using the invisible string. And the invisible string is talking about even though we're not in the physical space as someone, there's a string that connects us, and our love follows that string wherever that person is in the world. And I think specifically in Liam's class, that teacher, Miss Ella, used that to be able to convey that even though Liam's not in our class, we can still love him. We can still think about him. We can still do all of that, and he can do that to us, but we're not in the same space.
FADEL: Do you have a lot of kids that are absent?
KUHLMAN: Our typical absence ranges 20 to 30 kids on a normal day. As we hit after Martin Luther King Day, we had a rate around 194 students out.
FADEL: Wow.
KUHLMAN: That was COVID levels of absenteeism. And then we worked with families, and we got some back. And now we just last week initiated a virtual learning option. So our families who are super afraid to come out of their house, they can learn online.
FADEL: How are you both doing?
CENTENO: Day by day for me, you know. I come home, and sometimes you have to turn off your phone. You have to disconnect, hit yourself on do not disturb for a while to mentally check in and make sure you are OK.
FADEL: Jason, same question for you.
KUHLMAN: You know, I don't know. People are saying, oh, did you take time for yourself? I want to say, that'll happen after this is all done. I love the Jelly Roll song - I'm not all right, but it'll be OK. And I think that's how I kind of look at it. But right now, we're in the heat of things, and we just need to do what we need to do to get it done and keep our families safe.
FADEL: After all that's happened, Kuhlman says some of his students wrote letters to ICE to tell them what they think.
There's one I'm reading right now, and it's a little paper that says, hello, winter, with a snowman.
(LAUGHTER)
FADEL: And it says, dear ICE agents, I think you should be more kind, and can you please stop being too rough with people? Please be nice to the people and kids.
KUHLMAN: When do we start listening to our children? 'Cause sometimes they see life in a very different way that maybe adults need to look at. Those are perfect words to mimic that and to listen to.
FADEL: Jason Kuhlman is the principal at Valley View Elementary in Columbia Heights, Minnesota. That's where Liam Conejo Ramos goes to school. Kevin Centeno is the community school coordinator. We asked the Department of Homeland Security for a statement on Liam and his father's release. Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin called the judge's order absurdly lawless. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche has already said that the administration will appeal.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "I AM NOT OKAY")
JELLY ROLL: (Singing) I'm not OK, but it's all going to be all right. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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