The nation's two largest teachers unions joined a lawsuit on Wednesday challenging the Trump administration's immigration policy change allowing enforcement on school grounds and other sensitive locations.
Administrators of a private early childhood school in Oregon also joined the lawsuit, saying their jobs and the education of the children they serve were interrupted as a result of the administration's policy change after Immigration and Customs Enforcement apprehended a parent on school grounds.
The court documents describe "a violent ICE enforcement action on the school grounds" in mid-July that included law enforcement officers shattering the car window of a student's father and detaining him while he was dropping off his 2-year-old. Following the incident, Oregon's Guidepost Montessori School saw a drop in student attendance and in interest from new families, the new parties in the lawsuit claim.
The lawsuit was originally filed in April on behalf of parties including Latinx farmworker labor union Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste. It is among a string of legal challenges seeking to undo the U.S. Department of Homeland Security policy change. The original lawsuit, as well as the document filed this week, claim that "attendance rates dropped in half and school administrators saw an influx of parents picking their children up from school in the middle of the day after hearing reports that immigration officials were in the area."
K-12 leaders and lawsuits are increasingly reporting a significant and sometimes direct impact on students and parents as a result of the Trump administration's immigration policies.
In Los Angeles Unified School District, for example, ICE activity has included failed attempts to enter two elementary schools after officers allegedly lied about having parents' permission to speak to students. In that incident, administrators denied the officers' requests.
More recently, a high school student with disabilities was handcuffed and held at gunpoint "in an alleged case of mistaken identity" just prior to the start of the school year, according to LAUSD officials.
Many of the recorded incidents have taken place during student pickup or drop-off hours on or near school grounds.
Such incidents have created trauma and school avoidance, educators and immigration rights advocates said during a virtual press event last week.
A report released in July documented the toll of the current administration's policies on students, which has led to absenteeism, disengagement and social isolation, according to psychiatric researchers from University of California, Riverside and New York University.
That report called schools “critical sites for early identification and support” of students' struggles but added that they can also be places where immigrant youth “experience trauma-related avoidance, disengagement, or behavioral challenges.”
