Tag: raids

  • Nearby ICE Raids Stoke Fear on North Carolina Campuses

    Nearby ICE Raids Stoke Fear on North Carolina Campuses

    North Carolina campus leaders are urging international students and staff to take precautions and promising to protect student privacy amid a surge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids in the Raleigh, Durham and Charlotte areas. But some students and employees fear campuses aren’t doing enough to protect them after the U.S. Department of Homeland Security boasted upwards of 250 arrests in and around Charlotte on Wednesday.

    North Carolina State University’s executive vice chancellor and provost, Warwick Arden, sent a memo to deans and department heads on Tuesday, offering guidance on how to handle any brushes with federal and state agents in Raleigh.

    He stressed that the university follows all federal laws—including the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, so administrators shouldn’t release information about students or staff without consulting the Office of General Counsel. He also advised all international students, faculty and staff to “carry evidence of their immigration status with them at all times,” including their passports if they leave the Raleigh area.

    “I want to assure you that we are closely monitoring developments that may impact our community,” Arden wrote in the memo.

    Duke University administrators sent a similar message to students and staff on Wednesday, recommending that international students and employees carry travel documents “at all times” and promising to safeguard student privacy in accordance with federal law. They also told employees to call Duke police if federal agents requested information or sought to enter nonpublic areas.

    Sharon L. Gaber, chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, released a memo on Monday, which was updated Thursday, reminding students and employees of the university’s protocols if they encounter anyone who identifies themselves as federal law enforcement. She urged them to call campus police, who “will work with the Office of Legal Affairs to review and verify any subpoenas or warrants that may be presented.”

    The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s interim executive vice chancellor and provost, James W. Dean Jr., also put out a message to students and staff on Tuesday, acknowledging “anxiety” caused by the presence of ICE officials and encouraging students and employees “to learn more about their rights and available resources.”

    Dean emphasized that the university “complies with all federal and state laws and guidance”; ICE has the right to approach individuals in public spaces, he said, but they need a warrant to access classrooms, offices or dorms.

    He also said that while FERPA prevents the university from sharing a student’s class schedule and immigration status, their name, address and phone number are public information unless a student previously told the registrar not to share such details. He directed concerned students to the dean of students for “individual supports and services.”

    Fears and Concerns

    Nearby raids have heightened fear and anxiety among students.

    Rumors have been swirling on social media about U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents and vehicles sighted near North Carolina State and UNC Charlotte, with students and nearby residents alerting each other about unrecognized cars near campus. Ojo Obrero, an ICE activity tracker created by the Latino and immigrant advocacy organization Siembra NC, showed several sightings of CBP agents and vehicles reported within two miles of UNC Charlotte.

    “The University has been monitoring available information since Customs and Border Protection arrived in Charlotte and had no confirmed reports of CBP on campus; however, they have been in the area,” Christy Jackson, deputy chief communications officer at UNC Charlotte, said in a statement to Inside Higher Ed.

    North Carolina State Police have likewise found “no credible sightings of federal agents on campus” at North Carolina State, Mick Kulikowski, the university’s director of strategic communications and media relations, wrote to Inside Higher Ed.

    Despite memos and reassurances, students and staff expressed frustration that campus leaders’ statements didn’t make a stronger commitment to resisting federal immigration enforcement efforts.

    A joint statement from the American Association of University Professors chapter at UNC Chapel Hill, UE Local 150 and the student organization transparUNCy slammed their administration’s response as “tepid” and “inadequate to meet the moment of fear and uncertainty.” The groups called on university leaders to “do all in their power to deny CBP access to our community,” because “example after example has shown that CBP is acting above the law.”

    Administrators have “instead taken the cowardly approach of saying they’re just going to follow the law,” said Michael Palm, president of the UNC Chapel Hill AAUP chapter. “Everyone that I know who works or studies at UNC understands that we have to protect ourselves, because no one in the administration will help with that.”

    Palm said he and other faculty members are allowing fearful students to attend class remotely after some of his colleagues found them “afraid to come to class, afraid to leave home, if they’re on campus, afraid to leave their dorms.”

    “There has been a real network effort of mutual care to make sure that those students are not just not punished for missing class or excluded from class but also to make sure that they’re getting food, medicine and other supplies,” he said, “and human contact and support so they don’t feel even more isolated and afraid than they already, understandably, do.”

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  • Educators push for virtual schooling in response to ICE raids

    Educators push for virtual schooling in response to ICE raids

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    Educators are pushing for virtual schooling as an option for students and families who are living in fear of the increasing Immigrations and Customs Enforcement presence in and around school communities nationwide. 

    “This is an emergency,” said Chicago Board of Education member Anusha Thotakura during a public board meeting on Oct. 23. “Although the safest place for kids is at school, even if there is something that we can do to prevent one family being separated or one child coming back home to see that their parents are not there, we need to explore those avenues.”

    The Chicago area, including its schools and students, has been hit hard in recent weeks by the federal government’s immigration crackdown. There have been multiple individuals apprehended by ICE on or near school grounds, including near elementary schools. 

    The Trump administration said the increased enforcement is needed to reduce illegal immigration and is important for national security and safety. Changes issued in January to Department of Homeland Security policy no longer protect schools from enforcement raids. Since then, schools have witnessed apprehensions during drop-off and pick-up hours. 

    In an effort to resist, school communities in Chicago —  including oftentimes their teachers and education leaders — have formed school patrols and walking school buses, are providing families with groceries, and are also taking part in neighborhood watches by blowing whistles to alert community members when enforcement agents are nearby, Chicago education leaders have said. 

    However, travel to and from school is the main concern, said board member Emma Lozano during Thursday’s board meeting. 

    “Safe passage does not exist right now, they are all over the street,” Lozano said, saying that community members were being apprehended as recently as Thursday morning, leaving children frightened that they’d return to an empty house after school. “Our parents are asking for remote learning if possible.” 

    However, such a decision would likely require Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker to declare a state of emergency, board members said.

    Chicago Teacher’s Union President Stacy Davis Gates also pushed the district earlier this week, saying to K-12 Dive that while a virtual academy already exists, it is not yet available to all students. In the meantime, educators are being as flexible and creative as possible to ensure students can still complete their assignments, she said.

    Chicago wouldn’t be the first to float the idea of a virtual academy as a way to ensure both the safety and academic continuation for children of immigrants and immigrant children. In August, the Los Angeles Unified School District emphasized its virtual school option after a 15-year-old LAUSD student with disabilities was detained outside of a district high school at gunpoint. 

    In March, the New York State Education Department also told superintendents across the state that school districts were allowed to offer virtual learning “to individual students who may be unable or averse to attending school, including during times of political uncertainty.” Those students could include English Language Learners, immigrant and migrant students, as well as “others who may be affected and reluctant to attend school in person due to concerns about their personal safety and security,” said the letter.

    The option for remote schooling comes as recent immigration enforcement policies under the Trump administration — including vagueness surrounding who will be arrested and how long they may be detained — is causing chronic anxiety in students. These federal immigration enforcement policies have been linked to absenteeism, classroom disengagement and heightened emotional distress, according to a July report released by psychiatric researchers at University of California, Riverside and New York University. This, the researchers wrote, has led students “to avoid school or withdraw from public life.”

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  • Police Raids Targeted Michigan Palestine Activists

    Police Raids Targeted Michigan Palestine Activists

    The Graduate Employees’ Organization union says pro-Palestine activists were targeted.

    Nicholas Klein/iStock/Getty Images

    Police raided five homes connected to University of Michigan pro-Palestinian activists on Wednesday, according to the university’s graduate student union. A spokesperson for the state’s attorney general told Inside Higher Ed the investigation is into “multi-jurisdictional acts of vandalism” but didn’t provide many more details.

    Danny Wimmer, press secretary for Michigan attorney general Dana Nessel, a Democrat, said the search warrants were part of an attorney general investigation “against multiple individuals in multiple jurisdictions including Ann Arbor, Canton and Ypsilanti.”

    Wimmer said many agencies were involved Wednesday, including local, state and federal authorities, but he didn’t name specific ones and didn’t say whether personal items had been confiscated. He said the searches weren’t related to campus protest activity.

    In a post on X, the attorney general’s office said the alleged vandalism was “against multiple homes, organizations, and businesses in multiple counties.”

    Lavinia Dunagan, a Ph.D. student who is a co-chair of the union’s communications committee, said at least seven people were detained but none arrested. All are students, save for one employee of Michigan Medicine, she said. She declined to name them, saying she didn’t know all of their identities and citing safety concerns for those who were targeted.

    Brian Taylor, a university spokesperson, deferred questions to the attorney general’s office.

    Dunagan said those detained were taken into officers’ cars and not allowed to leave until they provided information and allowed cheek swabs. She said the FBI, Michigan State Police and local police were involved.

    The union—the Graduate Employees’ Organization, or GEO—said in a news release that “officers detained and questioned two activists, including a member of GEO, and confiscated their electronic devices” in Ann Arbor, home of Michigan’s flagship campus. GEO also said four people were “detained and released” in Ypsilanti, and one home was “raided” in Canton.

    “The officers also confiscated personal belongings from multiple residences and at least two cars,” GEO said, adding that “at this time, all activists are safe.”

    Wimmer did say U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement wasn’t involved, and that the attorney general’s office believes all subjects of the search warrants are U.S. citizens. The union also said in its release, “We are not aware of any visa holders being affected by these raids.”

    The state chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said in a news release that homes of “students and former students at the University of Michigan–Ann Arbor who were involved in pro-Palestinian activism were raided.” The organization said, “Property damage at residences took place, and individuals were handcuffed without charges during the aggressive raids.”

    The organization said it had staff “on location at one of the raided residences” and it “continues to offer legal assistance to those impacted and is actively monitoring the situation for potential civil rights violations.”

    Dunagan said, “We are just really concerned about potentially future repression of political activity.”

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  • FBI Raids Indiana U Cybersecurity Professor’s Homes

    FBI Raids Indiana U Cybersecurity Professor’s Homes

    Federal investigators spent hours last Friday raiding two homes belonging to a cybersecurity professor at Indiana University at Bloomington, multiple local news outlets reported.

    It’s unclear what investigators were looking for, but Chris Bavender, an FBI spokesperson, confirmed to The Herald-Times that the raid was “court authorized law enforcement activity,” and that the agency had “no further comment.”

    Xiaofeng Wang, a tenured computer science professor and director of IU’s Center for Security and Privacy in Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, has worked at the university for more than 20 years. But after numerous government agents began removing boxes from the Bloomington home Wang shares with his wife, Nianli Ma—who also worked for IU’s library as a systems analyst and programmer—neighbors told The Herald-Times they knew little about the couple, including their names. 

    Law enforcement also arrived Friday morning at a home belonging to the couple in Carmel, about an hour and 15 minutes north of Bloomington. A video taken by a neighbor and published by local NBC affiliate, WTHR, shows FBI agents shouting, “FBI, come out!” through a megaphone pointed toward the residence. 

    An unidentified woman then exits the home holding a phone, which agents confiscated before questioning her and later removing evidence from the home. The woman left the scene and returned hours later with her lawyer, who later told WTHR “they’re not sure yet what the investigation is about.”

    According to The Bloomingtonian, Wang was fired from IU in early March. Both his and Ma’s employee profiles have been scrubbed from the university’s websites.

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  • Denver Public Schools sues over Trump policy allowing on-campus ICE raids

    Denver Public Schools sues over Trump policy allowing on-campus ICE raids

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    Dive Brief:

    • Denver Public Schools has issued the latest salvo in the battle over the Trump administration’s controversial new policy allowing immigration raids on school grounds with a lawsuit filed Wednesday in federal court. 
    • In Denver Public Schools v. Noem — believed to be the first lawsuit against the policy from a school system — the district seeks to undo the Trump administration’s Jan. 21 decision to allow immigration enforcement actions at “sensitive” locations such as schools, places where children gather, medical facilities and places of worship.
    • In the interim, Denver Public Schools is asking for a temporary restraining order to prohibit U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection enforcement of the policy.

    Dive Insight:

    The new Trump policy lifted the practice of avoiding immigration enforcement activities at places where students gather. Versions of the protected areas guidance have been in place for more than 30 years, according to the Denver system’s 25-page lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado.

    According to the lawsuit, school attendance has dropped “noticeably” across all schools in the Denver district — and particularly in schools with “new-to-country families and where ICE raids have already occurred” — since announcement of the new policy.

    The suit alleges that the policy is hurting the district’s ability to provide education and life services to children who aren’t attending school out of fear of immigration enforcement action. Colorado’s largest district, Denver Public Schools enrolls more than 90,000 students across 207 schools.

    In rescinding 2021 Biden administration language on the topic, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security said in a press release that the reversal would empower Customs and Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to enforce immigration laws and catch criminals who are in the country illegally.

    “Criminals will no longer be able to hide in America’s schools and churches to avoid arrest,” the statement read. “The Trump Administration will not tie the hands of our brave law enforcement, and instead trusts them to use common sense.”

    In its lawsuit, however, Denver Public Schools alleges that the new policy “gives federal agents virtually unchecked authority to enforce immigration laws in formerly protected areas, including schools. As reported to the public, the sole restraint on agents is that they use their own subjective ‘common sense’ to determine whether to carry out enforcement activities at formally safeguarded locations such as schools.”

    The lawsuit further claims that the DHS directive has not been backed up with formal written guidance and seeks for such a policy to be made “available for public inspection.”

    In a Thursday statement to CBS News Colorado, Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary of public affairs at DHS, said officers “would need secondary supervisor approval before any action can be taken in locations such as a church or a school. We expect these to be extremely rare.”

    The Denver Public Schools lawsuit comes the same week as a challenge filed by 27 religious groups — including the Mennonite Church, Episcopal Church and Central Conference of American Rabbis — that accuses the new immigration policy of infringing upon their congregations’ religious freedoms. Another lawsuit filed in January and led by the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, a Quaker organization, also alleges the policy infringes upon religious freedoms.

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