By Ted Hesson and Emily Green

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A federal judge on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to refrain from deporting Guatemalan unaccompanied migrant children with active immigration cases while a legal challenge plays out.

Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee based in Washington, D.C., kept in place an earlier judicial block on the policy, sharply criticizing the administration’s unproven assertion that the children’s parents wanted them deported.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration attempted to deport 76 Guatemalan minors being held in U.S. custody in a surprise move in the early morning on August 31, sparking a lawsuit and emergency hearing that temporarily halted the move.

Justice Department lawyer Drew Ensign initially said that the children’s par

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