MIAMI – The presidents of the Broward Teachers Union and United Teachers of Dade are fighting back against concerns they are hearing from some families about Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“There (have) been no ICE raids at any schools, I want to make that clear,” said United Teachers of Dade President Karla Hernandez-Mats.
“ICE is not storming our schools,” added Broward Teachers Union President Anna Fusco. “There is a protocol, laws governing it, and it has not happened at any school across the country and certainly hasn’t happened in Broward.”
Household immigration enforcement remains hemmed in by federal law: The Fourth Amendment, a constitutional right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, and the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.
“Unless a signed warrant by a federal judge for a specific person, that is the only way they will have access to a person,” said Hernandez-Mats.
“You don’t get to storm a school because we had a particular group of people decide that this is the way we are going to get illegal immigrants out of our country,” said Fusco. “You are safe to come to school.”
Alexandra, a ninth grader at Westland Hialeah Senior High, said it seems natural that some people are worried about headlines of ICE actions.
“A lot of people live in Hialeah and they come from other places like Colombia, Cuba,” she said. “Of course they are going to be scared to go back to the place they escaped with their lives to come here to do better things with their life.”
Miami-Dade School Board Member Luisa Santos pointed out that district policy states that if law enforcement did show up at a school site with a warrant, the first step is the district’s legal counsel reviewing it.
“The law has not changed, every child, regardless of immigration status, has access and right to a free public education,” said Santos. “I think that is the beauty of this country, that we are a democracy. I have been an undocumented student in our Miami-Dade County Public Schools. The fear I felt is that you might come home and a parent may not be there.
“Our schools will continue to be safe places for learning,” Santos continues. “It is not a case here or anywhere in this country that students are allowed to be questioned without process and documentation, so it is important for families to understand that there are protections in places and laws that must be followed every step of the way, and I think that will reassure families.”
“We can’t politicize children,” said Hernandez-Mats.
“We have a protocol,” said Fusco. “If you need to come into our school and speak and see somebody, you don’t just get to say, ‘I have a badge and a gun, I am the end all, be all, Lord Jesus Christ, I am going to storm your school.’ That is not happening.”
ADDITIONAL INFO
Warrants and Subpoenas: What to look out for and how to respond
Link to the AFTs the AFTs Protecting Our Students and Families Toolkit in English and Spanish.
TRUMP CAMPAIGN PROMISE: ELIMINATING THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
At a campaign stop in Wisconsin in September, then President-Elect Donald Trump told a cheering crowd, “I say it all the time, I am dying to get back to do this, we will ultimately eliminate the Federal Department of Education…we’ll send it back to the states…and you know, some states will do a fantastic job, some won’t…and it is the same ones that are laggards right now.”
Florida is ranked as one of the least educated states in a 2024 survey, coming in at number 48. Scholaroo’s data team analyzed the states with the highest and lowest levels of education on two factors: educational level and school quality.
United Teachers of Dade President Karla Hernandez-Mats said eliminating the U.S. Department of Education would require congressional approval and even with public will at his sails after winning the popular vote, she doesn’t think Trump has the votes in Congress to make the campaign promise a reality.
“Trump doesn’t have the power to end the department himself, but the president has the ability on his own to shrink the department’s footprint—and then ask Congress to do the rest,” writes Brooke Shultz for EdWeek.
If eliminated, and if Congress continues to authorize appropriations for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and Title 1 funding that the majority of school sites in Miami-Dade and Broward rely on for special needs education and funding to assist students in low-income areas, the teacher union presidents worry if the State of Florida would in fact direct those funds to those services or decide to do something else with the taxpayer money, like expand the voucher system families can apply to direct public tax dollars to private school tuition, gutting the public schools of the critical funding they say is needed to assist special needs children and students from low-income families.
What is Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)? “The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is a law that makes available a free appropriate public education to eligible children with disabilities throughout the nation and ensures special education and related services to those children, supports early intervention services for infants and toddlers and their families, and awards competitive discretionary grants.”
According to the State of Florida’s website, Title I provides additional resources to schools with economically disadvantaged students.
UTD said more than 70% of school sites in Miami-Dade are Title 1 schools, BTU said that percentage is at more than 80% in Broward.
Hernandez-Mats also expressing discontent that Elon Musk, an unelected billionaire from South Africa who is not familiar with the United States’ public school system, and would never rely on America’s public school education for his children due to his wealth, is making “off the cuff” funding decisions on how Americans’ tax dollars are spent which could strip funding for teachers and hurt our most vulnerable school children.
She said taxpayer dollars should not be funding welfare cuts for billionaires on the backs of everyday Americans.
ADDITIONAL LINKS