Former President Barack Obama addressed the situation involving 5-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, whose father was taken into custody during an immigration operation, in a new interview released on Saturday.

Photos of Ramos standing by himself with ICE agents when his father was detained went viral. 

"That child is equal to mine or any child. His immigration status, his nationality does not change the love and decency that we should be showing that child, but what is also true is we are a nation of laws," Obama said on Brian Tyler Cohen's podcast on Saturday.

"We have borders, and we've got to figure out an immigration policy that is orderly and that is fair and is enforced in a sensitive way that is compatible with our values but may not fully capture the degree to which that kid should have the same chances in life as a U.S. citizen kid," he also said.

Obama continued, saying, "But we've got to accommodate the reality that the majority of American people think that there's a difference between someone who is a U.S. citizen and somebody who is not and that they want an orderly immigration system."

Obama lamented those who ridicule voters who suggest they want "some immigration enforcement" by saying they "do not care about that kid, so you must be a bad person."

In the same interview, Obama expressed support for the anti-ICE protesters in Minnesota.

“It is important for us to recognize the unprecedented nature of what ICE was doing in Minneapolis, St Paul, the way that federal agents, ICE agents were being deployed, without any clear guidelines, training, pulling people out of their homes, using five-year-olds to try to bait their parents, all the stuff that we saw, teargassing crowds, simply who were standing there, not breaking any laws,” he said.