Did the school of Liam Ramos, 5-year-old detained by ICE in Minnesota, close because of bomb threat?

In early February 2026, people on social media claimed that the school attended by Liam Ramos, the 5-year-old boy photographed in a blue beanie and detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, was closed due to a bomb threat as Liam returned to his Minnesota home from a detention center in Texas.

One Facebook post (archived), which described a "barrage of bomb threats" aimed at the school, read in part:

Liam Ramos is finally back home in Minnesota, but the first thing his classmates learned today was that their school had to shut down after a barrage of bomb threats aimed at the place that loved him first. The same kids who drew pictures and wrote letters begging for his release are now learning what it means to be treated like a threat just for standing by their friend. This is the civics lesson Trump's America keeps forcing on elementary school classrooms, and it is written in lockdown drills and police tape instead of textbooks.

Other posts on Facebook (archived), Threads (archived), Reddit (archived) and Bluesky (archived) similarly shared that Liam's school district shut down classes for the day. Snopes readers searched the site and emailed us to find out if the claim was true.

The claim was true. Columbia Heights Public Schools, which Liam's school is a part of, closed all of its schools on Feb. 2, 2026, due to bomb threats directed at multiple schools within the district.

On the morning of Feb. 2, Columbia Heights Public Schools, which is in the suburbs north of Minneapolis, posted to its Facebook page (archived) in English and Spanish that it would be closed for the day "due to a credible threat" and that no students or staff should report to school.

Reached by email, a district spokesperson shared a police news release on the subject and told Snopes that the threat was generalized and sent to other districts, and was a common kind of threat for schools or districts in the news. The full news release stated:

In the early morning hours on February 2nd, staff from the Columbia Heights Public Schools became aware of a bomb threat that had been emailed to multiple schools in the district. Due to the timing of the information, it was not possible to fully investigate the threats prior to student arrival, and a decision was made to prioritize the safety of staff and students and cancel school for the day.

The Columbia Heights Police Department immediately responded to investigate the incident and searched the impacted campuses with the assistance of the Minneapolis Police Department, Columbia Heights Fire, and Metro Transit Police. No suspicious packages or devices were located. The police department is working with other law enforcement agencies to continue the investigation into the source of the threats.

Columbia Heights Public Schools will resume classes on February 3rd.

No further releases are planned at this time.

The same news release was posted to the school district's website (archived). Other recent statements on the website were about Liam's return home and four other students the district said were being held in an ICE detention center in Texas.

Snopes previously reported that school district's officials said at a news conference at Valley View Elementary School, Liam's school, after the 5-year-old was detained that he had been used by ICE as "bait" to make arrests.