This past week, as several MS NOW hosts fretted over the recent deportation of a Babson College student to Honduras, it was barely mentioned that a court had issued a final order of deportation against her. She was apprehended at Logan International Airport as she tried to fly to Texas to visit her family for Thanksgiving.
National correspondent and frequent deportation critic Jacob Soboroff went so far as to claim that the story proves that it is "complete BS" that the Donald Trump administration is "going after the worst of the worst."
On Thursday, when Morning Joe covered the story for the second time, co-host Joe Scarborough mocked the administration's DHS:
What tough guys -- what tough guys, the Trump administration ripping 19-year-old girls away, who went home to visit their parents Thanksgiving. Been here since they were seven. What -- what -- what tough guys. And what a lie. What a total lie to say, "We're only going after the worst of the worst."
On the same day's Deadline: White House, which also covered the story for the second time, host Nicolle Wallace proclaimed:
As Donald Trump continues to escalate and ramp up his immigration practices and crackdown, despite its deep unpopularity with the American people, his claim that the only people impacted would be the so-called "worst of the worst" has been exposed as a flagrant lie over and over again with the parents of veterans, daycare workers, U.S. citizens, grandmas all caught up in this mess of Donald Trump's mass deportation strategy.
Deep unpopularity? Fact check: In October, The New York Times was unhappy to report its poll found "the share of registered voters who favor deporting immigrants living in the country illegally — 54 percent — has remained unchanged."
As Soboroff appeared to present clips of an interview that he did with the student, Any Lucia Lopez Belloza, the MS NOW host asked him if the Trump administration is now deporting "dreamers." Soboroff grumbled:
That's certainly what it -- what it looks like. And it's not just not right. It's just -- it's complete BS that they are going after the worst of the worst, and I think it's so important that you point that out, and we point it out time and time again because I do think that there is a risk of people getting tired -- people wanting to know less -- people not feeling like this is as bad or as egregious as the family separation policy where people were being ripped apart deliberately during the last administration.
Back on Tuesday, afternoon host Katy Tur gave an unchallenged forum to Belloza's attorney, Todd Pomerleau, to rant about the case. After calling the deportation a "dystopian nightmare" and "absolute child abuse," he made a crack comparing MAGA to the Redcoats from the American Revolution:
She's flown multiple times in the last year, all within the United States, visiting numerous schools, and she chose to go to Boston, you know, where we fought a revolutionary war years ago against Redcoats. And now we're fighting red hats on a daily basis. This is a MAGA roulette. You're playing with your life when you get on a plane and choose to fly in the United States. It doesn't matter if you're traveling internationally or if you're a college student dreamer.
They come and get you and they ship you off in the middle of the night with no recourse. Well, we have a Constitution. It may be on fire, but we're here to extinguish it one lawsuit at a time. And we're not going to stop until we bring Any back to the United States. This is God-damned disgusting what they did to her.
Between Monday and Thursday, MS NOW ran seven segments on the story on various shows, but only once was it mentioned that an order of deportation had been issued in the case as a clip of Soboroff's interview aired on Thursday's Katy Tur Reports.
According to a statement by DHS spokesperson Alicia McLaughlin, the order was issued in 2015.
Transcripts follow:
MS NOW
Katy Tur Reports
December 1, 2025
2:48 p.m.
KATY TUR: Nineteen-year-old Any Lucia Lopez Belloza was on her way home from college for Thanksgiving to surprise her parents, but she never got there. She was detained by immigration agents at Boston airport, and instead of being sent back home to Texas to Austin, Texas, she was deported to Honduras, a country she has known -- not known or even seen since she was seven years old. Joining us, Any's attorney, Todd Pomerleau. Todd, thank you for joining us. Where is Any right now? And how is she doing?
TODD POMERLEAU, IMMIGRATION ATTORNEY: Well, she's considerably distraught and, you know, absolutely understandable given what happened to her. Last, you know, week ago, she was trying to surprise her family -- to fly home for Thanksgiving and to see her two little sibling sisters, mom and her dad, you know. A family friend who her dad works for in a tailoring shop was the only one who knew she was coming to town. You know, most college kids can't afford to fly home for a holiday. ...
Gets arrested at Logan International Airport. It's the third such case we've had in the last few months where women just get detained with no warning -- no warrant. She had no idea what was happening, and she's a 19-year-old child under the immigration laws -- under the age of 21 -- and a scholarship recipient at Babson University, you know, living the American dream. Any's dream basically has turned into this dystopian nightmare of immigration and customs abuse. That's what it is. It's not enforcement of the law. This is absolute child abuse.
(...)
She's flown multiple times in the last year, all within the United States, visiting numerous schools, and she chose to go to Boston, you know, where we fought a revolutionary war years ago against Redcoats. And now we're fighting red hats on a daily basis. This is a MAGA roulette. You're playing with your life when you get on a plane and choose to fly in the United States.
It doesn't matter if you're traveling internationally or if you're a college student dreamer. They come and get you and they ship you off in the middle of the night with no recourse. Well, we have a Constitution. It may be on fire, but we're here to extinguish it one lawsuit at a time. And we're not going to stop until we bring Any back to the United States. This is God-damned disgusting what they did to her.
(...)
Deadline: White House
December 2, 2025
5:23 p.m.
NICOLLE WALLACE: An alarming new sign that the lawlessness of Donald Trump's mass deportation campaign may be expanding after a college student was deported despite a deportation stay from a federal judge. Amy Lucia Lopez Belloza, a freshman at Babson College outside of Boston, was on her way to board a plane back to Texas to see her parents and two little sisters for Thanksgiving break when she was stopped by immigration agents, handcuffed and placed in an unmarked vehicle. Two days later, she was deported to Honduras, a country she hadn't been to since she was seven years old.
(...)
Morning Joe
December 4, 2025
7:51 a.m.
MIKA BRZEZINSKI: Welcome back, there are new developments in a story that we brought to you earlier this week. A college student who was detained at a Boston area airport, shackled and deported to Honduras while trying to fly home to Texas to visit her family for Thanksgiving.
(...)
ANY LUCIA LOPEZ BELLOA, DEPORTED TO HONDURAS: And I didn't even know that I was going to get deported until I was on the plane.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: What -- what -- what tough guys -- what tough guys, the Trump administration ripping 19-year-old girls away, who went home to visit their parents Thanksgiving. Been here since they were seven. What -- what -- what tough guys. And what a lie. What a total lie to say, "We're only going after the worst of the worst." This happens so much. Jacob Soboroff, thank you so much for being with us. And thank you so much for for bringing us that interview. Please tell me more about what you learned.
JACOB SOBOROFF: Well, when you talk to Any Lucia Lopez Belloza, Joe, you feel exactly what I think all of us feel, which is this is, as you said, someone who came here when they were seven years old, who was on a scholarship to Babson, who wanted to go home to surprise her mom and dad in Texas, only to be directed to customer service, where she was met by federal agents, handcuffed and eventually shackled, and sent back to Honduras. Because she was described as an, quote unquote, "illegal alien," one of the "worst of the worst," a criminal, in the words of Gregory Bovino, the border patrol chief who's been going all around the country picking off people, doing their quotidian activities. And exactly the point that you are making is what I wanted to know from her. People keep calling the folks that are being picked up off the street the "worst of the worst," and I want to know if she felt that way about herself. So here's a little bit more of what we talked about.
What's it like for you to hear people like you described in that way -- as being the "worst of the worst" -- as being a criminal?
(...)
What do you want Donald Trump to know? If the President is watching this interview and he sees that his Department of Homeland Security just picked up a college freshman from Babson who was studying business and, you know, wanted to have a bright future ahead of her in the United States. What do you want the President to know?
(...)
BRZEZINSKI: Thank for bringing us that story.
SCARBOROUGH: Thank you, Jacob, so much.
It really brings it home. It really does. Thank you, Jacob.
SCARBOROUGH: Brought here when she was seven years old by her parents fleeing violence, played by the rules, worked hard, studied hard, went to Babson College, and got deported for going home to see her family on Thanksgiving like so many other college students do.
(...)
Chris Jansing Reports
December 4, 2025
12:45 p.m.
ALEX WITT: Meantime, still ahead, a cable news exclusive: My colleague, Jacob Soboroff's conversation with a student deported to Honduras just while on the way home to surprise her parents for Thanksgiving.
(...)
WITT: We are back with a cable news exclusive. For the first time, we're hearing from a Babson College student who was deported while trying to fly home to surprise her family for Thanksgiving. Nineteen-year-old freshman Any Lucia Lopez Belloza was detained in the airport in Boston, and then held for two days before she was sent back to Honduras where she emigrated from when she was just seven years old. My colleague, Jacob Soboroff, spoke to her and joins me now. What story, Jacob -- what did she share with you?
SOBOROFF: Yeah, that's the key point, Alex, I think that this is a young woman who came to this country from Honduras when she was seven. She was 19 years old, a freshman at Babson College, going down to see her parents to surprise them for Thanksgiving. Greg Bovino, the chief patrol agent for Border Patrol that is going around the country executing the indiscriminate raids all across the United States, called her literally two days ago a criminal. That is not what she is. That is certainly not what she feels like.
(...)
Katy Tur Reports
December 4, 2025
2:47 p.m.
ANTONIA HYLTON: Nineteen-year-old college freshman Any Lucia Lopez Belloza was deported when she was trying to fly home to surprise her family for Thanksgiving. The student is now in Honduras after she was detained at Boston's Logan Airport.
(...)
Deadline: White House
December 4, 2025
5:44 p.m.
NICOLLE WALLACE: As Donald Trump continues to escalate and ramp up his immigration practices and crackdown, despite its deep unpopularity with the American people, his claim that the only people impacted would be the so-called "worst of the worst" has been exposed as a flagrant lie over and over again with the parents of veterans, daycare workers, U.S. citizens, grandmas all caught up in this mess of Donald Trump's mass deportation strategy. Our friend Jacob Soboroff sat down with one of those people, the college student whose story we brought you earlier in the week, Any Lucia Lopez Belloza, on her experience of being taken into ICE custody and deported to Honduras, a country that she has not been to or lived in since she was seven years old.
(...)
ANY LUCIA LOPEZ BELLOZA, DEPORTED TO HONDURAS: Many people like me -- many undocumented people who are getting themselves ready to go to college, it's really difficult for us because we try to find the best that we can to be able to fulfill our dreams, and people saying, like, we're criminals, it's just not right.
WALLACE: Jacob, I mean, she said "Dreamer." Are we now -- is America now -- is Donald Trump deporting Dreamers obviously now?
SOBOROFF: That's certainly what it -- what it looks like. And it's not just not right. It's just -- it's complete BS that they are going after the worst of the worst, and I think it's so important that you point that out, and we point it out time and time again because I do think that there is a risk of people getting tired -- people wanting to know less -- people not feeling like this is as bad or as egregious as the family separation policy where people were being ripped apart deliberately during the last administration.
But, as we've talked about over and over again, that is exactly what's happening. It is what happened in this case to Any. It is what is happening in 26 Federal Plaza in New York City on a regular basis. It is what's happening in states like Florida where the local law enforcement is deputized, and the thing about Any's case that I think probably resonates with so many people is that she was going home, as you discussed with her attorney, to meet and surprise her parents for Thanksgiving.
She was a college freshman on a scholarship in business school. This person is as American as you or I or anyone watching this broadcast right now, which why I encourage everybody to scan that little QR code in the corner of the screen and watch our complete interview to see who the people really are that Donald Trump and Stephen Miller and Gregory Bovino -- who called this specific person, Any, a criminal, are kicking out of this country.
WALLACE: It's also deeply unpopular --
MOLLY JONG-FAST, MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR: Yeah.
WALLACE: -- with the American people
JONG-FAST: No, I mean, what's amazing is about this administration is that this stuff is not popular, voters don't like it, and when you see interviews like this, I mean, you have to imagine that this is changing hearts and minds, right? There's no, you know, she is in college. People come -- by the way, think of the foreign students who are watching this thinking, like, "Do I want to send --?" because, you know, America gets a lot of money and American education gets a lot of money from foreign students. Think of the affluent parents who are like, "Oh, I could send my kid to the United States and they could get deported or sent to a Louisiana facility," as we've seen, or, "I could send them to Dubai and they'd be safe."
