A newly appointed federal judge from Trinidad and Tobago has quickly become a central figure in one of the most consequential immigration cases of the year.
Judge Sparkle L. Sooknanan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia stepped in on Sunday, Aug. 31, to block the Trump administration from deporting thousands of Guatemalan children, many of whom had already been placed on chartered flights.
The dramatic intervention came after the National Immigration Law Center filed an emergency request to halt the deportations. Lawyers for the minors argued that sending them to Guatemala would violate their due process rights and ignore legal protections designed specifically for unaccompanied children who cross the U.S. border.
Judge Sooknanan issued a temporary restraining order in the early morning hours, but initial confusion arose over whether her ruling applied to all affected minors. By midday, with planes waiting on Texas runways, she clarified her order to cover every Guatemalan child currently held in federal custody.
“I don’t want there to be any ambiguity about what I am ordering,” Judge Sooknanan said from the bench. “You cannot remove any children.” Within hours, immigration officials confirmed that the children had been taken off the planes.
Her order will remain in place for 14 days while the case proceeds, temporarily safeguarding nearly 2,000 children across government-run shelters.
A Historic Path to the Federal Bench
Judge Sooknanan’s decisive action reflects both her legal acumen and a career of excellence. Born in Trinidad and Tobago, she graduated summa cum laude from St. Francis College in 2002, earned an M.B.A. with distinction from Hofstra University in 2003, and obtained her J.D., summa cum laude, from Brooklyn Law School in 2010.
Her professional journey includes prestigious clerkships with Judge Eric N. Vitaliano of the Eastern District of New York, Judge Guido Calabresi of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, and Justice Sonia Sotomayor of the U.S. Supreme Court.
She later worked in the Department of Justice’s Civil Division Appellate Staff, rose to partnership at the law firm Jones Day, and served in senior leadership roles at the Justice Department before her appointment to the federal bench in January 2025.
A Judge to Watch
In her first year on the bench, Judge Sooknanan is already shaping immigration policy through her rulings. Her Labor Day weekend order highlights the judiciary’s role as a check on executive power and underscores the continuing legal battles over the treatment of immigrant children.
For now, thousands of minors remain in U.S. shelters instead of being deported to Guatemala—a reprieve made possible by a judge whose journey from Trinidad and Tobago to Washington, D.C. embodies the very immigrant story at the heart of America’s ongoing debate over migration and justice.
