Reuters World News - Child's ICE release, Texas Democrats, Pakistan and Grammys

Episode Date: February 2, 2026

Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos is back home in Minneapolis after his ICE detention. Texas Democrats flip a red seat and give the Republicans a "wake-up call." Pakistan's military retaliates against militants in Balochistan. Bad Bunny makes Grammys history. Plus, the reviews are in for "Melania."    Listen to the Morning Bid podcast ⁠⁠here⁠⁠. Sign up for the Reuters Econ World newsletter ⁠⁠here⁠⁠. Listen to the Reuters Econ World podcast ⁠⁠here⁠⁠. Find the Recommended Read here. Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hi, I'm Kim Vinal in Wanganui, New Zealand. It's Monday, February 2nd. Today, the five-year-old boy detained by ICE in Minnesota arrives home. A Democrat flips a red seat in Texas, and it's a wake-up call for Republicans. Pakistan targets Balochistan separatists. And the reviews are in for Melania, the big budget documentary about the First Lady. This is Reuters World News, bringing you. everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, seven days a week. The five-year-old boy taken into detention by ICE officers in Minneapolis has returned home.

Liam Conejo-Ramos and his father, Adrian, were detained following a raid last week. A federal judge ordered the pair be released, citing the constitutional requirement that an arrest warrant be based on a judge finding probable cause of a crime. The father and son had legally ended the US from Ecuador to request asylum. The image of Liam standing in the snow wearing a blue bunny hat with federal agents around him sparked outrage. Reuters journalist Christoph van der Peer went to Liam's house. We got to the neighbourhood in front of the house and it was snowing. We waited quite a while.

A lot of people started arriving at neighbours and concerned families. and they were bringing presents. So one family brought balloons and everyone wanted to see him and we spoke to one of the families and they were just really, really concerned for that little boy. Among them, resident Brenda Marquez. So we're here to show our love and support.

Us having a five-year-old, I just couldn't imagine what the mom has been going through. Christoph says, while some people gathered knew the family. Others, like resident Ed Higgins, just wanted to show their support. We need a lot of hope around here right now. Mayor of Columbia Heights, Amada Makwe-Simula, also turned up.

She said that there is a sense of really for that particular case, but there are still ice agents looming around, and as we were talking, she was pointing out at grey cars, and she says these are ice agents. just checking this place out. So while we have really good news and a ray of light that, you know, we have some family members coming back. There's still, ICE is still here this morning in Columbia Heights.

They don't care. To find out more about what it's been like for our journalists covering ICE operations in Minneapolis, tune in to our On Assignment podcast with Christopher Wal Jasper. There's a link to the episode in the show notes. In Texas, newly elected Democratic House representative Christian Manifi made ICE tactics a central part of his victory speech. It was one of two Democrat wins in special elections over the weekend. The other, a state Senate seat, won by Taylor Remit, had been in Republican hands for decades. And with the midterms coming up, Republican strategists are saying this is a wake-up call.

But as White House reporter, Trevor Honeycutt explains, President Trump is brushing off Rematt's win. So he's distancing himself from it. He had a really interesting reaction. First, he denied any knowledge of the race, even though he had made an endorsement in it prior. And then he also had this interesting observation where he said that it doesn't matter because I wasn't on the ballot. And of course, the key thing here is Trump may never be on another ballot again in his life, right? So, you know, the question is, can he still translate the magic of the moment? of kind of his own political persona into wins for other Republicans

because he's going to need to do that this year. Lawmakers in the US House will debate reforms to immigration and customs enforcement in two weeks' time. That's according to Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson. He says there's enough votes in the House to pass a spending package on Tuesday, which had funding for the Department of Homeland Security separated out. The vote will end a partial government shutdown. And lawmakers will then take up the issue of ICE tactics, a key demand of Democrats.

If you're in the market for some markets news, tune in to our sister podcast MorningBid to find out what's on the radar today and for the rest of the week. You can catch it wherever you get your podcasts. President Trump says Washington's Kennedy Center will close for two years for reconstruction, starting in July. The National Arts and Entertainment Center has seen a downturn following Trump's appointment of himself as chairman and the subsequent renaming of the building to the Trump-Kennedy Centre. That prompted many artists to withdraw from their scheduled performances in protest.

Trump announced the plan closure on social media, adding that it is subject to approval by the board. The centre did not immediately respond to a request for comment. To the latest in the Jeffrey Epstein fallout now. In the UK, former government minister and U.S. ambassador Peter Mandelson has resigned from Prime Minister Kier Stama's Labor Party after fresh documents revived scrutiny of his links to the convicted sex offender. Mandelson denies wrongdoing but says he won't cause labor further embarrassment. Separately, Stama is suggesting Britain's former Prince Andrew should testify before a U.S. Congressional Committee over his Epstein links after photos were released showing the prince kneeling over a woman

who is lying on the ground. And in Slovakia, Prime Minister Robert Fizzo saying he's accepted the resignation of his national security adviser Miloslav Lachak. Newly released messages show Lachak exchanging lighthearted

texts about women with Epstein back in 2018. Lachak also denies wrongdoing. Over to Pakistan now, where security forces have killed more than 140 militants in a 40-hour battle in the southwest of the country. It follows a series of coordinated gun and bomb attacks claimed by banned separatist group Baloch Liberation Army. Separatists have led an insurgency in the region for decades,

seeking greater autonomy and a larger share of the region's natural resources. But this is one of the deadliest flare-ups in years. Ariba Shahid in Karachi has more. Officials say that the militant groups are increasingly willing to use extreme methods and have sometimes deployed women in attacks, including suicide attacks. And they have targeted soft civilian targets, which the officials say use civilians as human shields. This is a shift that analysts see as basically a sign of a more organized, radicalized, and lethal phase of the insurgency by the Belhoch militants.

U.S. First Lady Melania Trump's self-titled and self-produced documentary, Melania, is off to an unexpectedly good start. The film follows Melania in the 20 days leading up to President Trump's second inauguration. But beating expectations doesn't mean it's a box office hit. Here's Reuters Entertainment correspondent, Dawn Tumleski. The film was initially expected to bring in about $5 million in its open. weekend. It exceeded those expectations. It brought in $7 million, which made it the third highest grossing film of the week. In the minds of reviewers, the movie has been candidly trashed.

It has a 7% fresh rating among critics on rotten tomatoes. And the critics have said, basically, this is a hagiography or in the words of one critic, an insult to hagiography. It's a very, this very fawning, almost, a very admiring look at the First Lady. Now, audiences have seemed to have a different reaction. Those who've gone to see the movie, about 70% of the audience is female. And those who have gone to see it have given it an A-Cinmus score. So they've given it a really high rating. They felt it was exactly the kind of film that they were looking for.

They felt it was a proper treatment of the First Lady. And finally for today, the Grammys, where Bad Bunny and Kendrick Lamar won big in an award ceremony that saw musicians lash out at President Trump's ICE tactics. Bad Bunny, the Latino rap star, made history, taking home the top prize for Album of the Year. It's a first for a Spanish album, which is a celebration of his Puerto Rican roots. Rapper Kendrick Lamar walked away with the five awards, and Olivia Dean, the British soul pop singer, one best new artist. And for today's recommended read, let's stick with the Grammys and all the looks from the red

carpet. We'll link to a set of photos of all the style on display in LA in the show notes. For more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app. Don't forget to follow us on your favourite podcast player. If you're listening on a smart speaker, just ask for the latest news from Reuters seven days a week. We'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show. Thank you.