A Guatemalan woman who sued the Trump administration this week for separating her from her 7-year-old son at the Mexican border will soon be reunited with her child, Justice Department lawyers said Thursday.

The assurance that steps were underway to release the boy to his mother came less than two hours before a scheduled hearing in federal court in Washington on the request by the woman's attorneys for a restraining order requiring the child's immediate release.


The fast-moving case seemed to typify the confusion over the Trump administration's policy of separating children from family members detained after crossing the Mexican border. About 2,500 children appear to have been separated from their parents in recent weeks, with plans to reunite them uncertain, even after President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday that he said would stop families from being split up.

Beata Mariana de Jesus Mejia-Mejia filed suit Tuesday, complaining that after she crossed the border with her son in Arizona last month and requested asylum, her child was "ripped" from her by immigration officials.

By the time of the hearing Thursday afternoon, lawyers for both sides told U.S. District Court Judge Paul Friedman that the boy, Darwin, was on the verge of being freed.

"I believe that this has actually been resolved. I think the child will be released today," said Mario Williams, an attorney for the mother.


"That's good to hear," Friedman replied, adding later: "I'm glad you were able to solve this."

A Justice Department attorney, Sarah Fabian, said she expected the boy to be released by 1:30 p.m. local time in Phoenix and then to be flown to Washington to reunite with his mother.

Williams said the pair expected to live in Austin, Texas, while her asylum claim goes forward. "She is with friends and family. She has a place to stay," he said.

POLITICO Playbook newsletter Sign up today to receive the #1-rated newsletter in politics Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. {{#success}} {{heading}} {{message}} {{heading}} {{message}} More Subscriptions {{message}}

Beata Mejia-Mejia was on hand in the Washington courtroom for the hearing, listening to the proceedings through an interpreter.


After the session, she spoke softly to a phalanx of reporters and camera crews, saying she was grateful that she might soon be reunited with her child.

"All I want is to be with my son. I want to see him. I appreciate all the attorneys and their help," Mejia-Mejia said. "My son is sad. I know my son, and like any mother I had a feeling that he is sad, but first and foremost he said we are going to be together.“

Williams told Friedman the case might go away if the boy's release took place as promised. "There is a possibility we could dismiss the entire lawsuit," he said.

After the hearing, however, an official with the firm that backed the lawsuit said they planned to try to convert it to a class action on behalf of all immigrant parents separated from their children in recent weeks.

"It is time to put this chapter, this very dark and sad and sick and disgusting chapter in this part of American history, behind us," said Mike Donovan of Libre by Nexus. "Those parents should be reunited with their families now. ... I authorized funding today for an amended complaint for a class action so that all individuals just like Ms. Mejis-Mejia can be represented in this case. Ms Mejia-Mejia will lead a class of plaintiffs who have been denied their very basic human right of custody and care of their minor children."

In a court filing just after noon Thursday, Justice Department lawyers informed the judge that a restraining order was unnecessary. The attorneys said the boy was in the custody of the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement.

"ORR has already begun the process of conducting the necessary checks to fulfill its statutory mandate to assure itself that Plaintiff ... is capable of providing for the child's physical and mental well-being," the government lawyers said. "ORR expects to be able to release [the boy] to Plaintiffs' custody, once those checks can be completed."

The Justice Department filing also made various technical arguments against the suit, arguing that it should have been filed in Arizona, not Washington, and that the child should have been named as a plaintiff since his release was being sought. The case also seeks damages for pain and suffering related to the separation of the mother and son.


Friedman called the government's legal points "significant" and said Mejia-Mejia's lawyers would have to address them if the case moved forward.

"Once the child is released, we can probably operate at a ... little more leisurely pace," he said.

The company backing the suit, Libre by Nexus, arranges bonds to help immigration detainees get released. However, the firm has faced allegations that it saddles immigrants with hefty fees for services like GPS tracking. The company is under investigation by state authorities in Virginia, New York and Washington, according to The Washington Post.

Libre by Nexus is also suing BuzzFeed for libel for reporting that the firm was under federal investigation. The attorney who filed that suit, John Shoreman, is serving as local counsel in Mejia-Mejia's suit and was in court Thursday.

Mejia-Mejia's suit is one of a relatively small number of court challenges to Trump's family separations, which unleashed a political firestorm in recent days.

Trump signed the executive order Wednesday that he said would bring an end to the practice, chiefly by detaining children along with their family members. Such a change appears to require the approval of a federal judge, which the administration sought Thursday in a Los Angeles court.

While Mejia-Mejia’s suit is framed as a challenge to the Trump administration’s family separation policy and mentions Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ “zero tolerance” directive in April — which called for all illegal border crossers to be prosecuted — she does not appear to have been affected by that policy since she was never charged with a crime.

"She wasn't caught up in the zero-tolerance policy," Williams said. "It's not the no-release policy, because she got released. It's the separation-of-the-child-from-your-mother policy to deter other people from crossing the border — which is unconstitutional."


Maria Curi contributed to this report.