Denver Public Schools sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Wednesday in an effort to block federal immigration agents from making arrests at schools as the Trump administration ramps up mass deportations nationwide.
DPS’s lawsuit, which was filed in U.S. District Court in Denver, comes a week after multiple federal agencies conducted raids across the Denver metro and prevented school buses from picking up children on the morning of Feb. 5.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents did not make any arrests at Denver schools on Feb. 5, but DPS leaders and educators across the metro area have become concerned about such a scenario after the Trump administration rescinded a 2011 policy that prevented immigration officials from making arrests at sensitive locations, such as schools.
“The fear that has set in… we can’t continue this way,” said Superintendent Alex Marrero in an interview. “We can’t fathom, we can’t function under the pretext that it will happen in our buildings.”
The goal of the lawsuit, he said, is to have the sensitive locations policy reinstated so that immigration activity at schools is restricted.
A representative for the Department of Homeland Security could not immediately be reached for comment.
Since last month’s policy change, fewer students are attending Denver schools and the district has had to respond to false reports of ICE activities on campus, according to the district’s lawsuit.
DPS has also trained staff on what to do if ICE officers show up at their buildings. Marrero told principals in a memo to deny agents entry into schools, which they can do if ICE agents don’t have a warrant signed by a judge, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Colorado.
DPS argued in the lawsuit that the drop in student attendance “constitutes a clear threat to DPS’s stability” because school funding is calculated based on how many students are in Denver schools.
In suing the Department of Homeland Security, Colorado’s largest school district is joining a host of states and groups across the nation that are turning to the courts to stop the various of executive actions President Donald Trump has issued since re-taking office on Jan. 20.
Attorneys general from 22 states, including Colorado, sued to stop Trump’s move to end birthright citizenship, which guarantees that children born in the U.S. are citizens regardless of their parents’ immigration status. Federal judges have temporarily halted the president’s order.
On Tuesday, 27 Christian and Jewish groups filed a lawsuit over the same policy change as DPS in an effort to stop immigration arrests at places of worship.
Colorado Sens. John Hickenlooper and Michael Bennet also announced this week that they have joined other senators in introducing a bill that would reinstate ICE’s sensitive locations policy and restrict arrests at schools, churches and hospitals.
“The Trump Administration’s efforts to allow ICE to take enforcement action in protected areas are deeply concerning and go against long-standing precedent,” said Bennet, a former DPS superintendent, in a statement. “Every Coloradan should feel safe to go to school, church and the doctor without fear of arrest.”
Trump has promised to carry out mass deportations now that he is back in office. His crackdown on immigration has implications for Colorado school districts, which have welcomed thousands of migrant children into their classrooms in recent years.
The influx of immigrant students has helped soften declining enrollment in public schools, which are losing pupils — and, therefore, funding — as birth rates fall statewide.
For DPS, the arrival of more than 4,700 immigrant students has, at least temporarily, led to an increase in enrollment in the past two academic years. The district has 90,450 pupils and at least 10% of them are immigrants, according to data from the Colorado Department of Education. The data does not include information on students’ immigration status and DPS does not collect such information either.
More than 40% of DPS students speak another language at home and more than half are Latino, according to the lawsuit.
“Every student — no matter what their status, make up — deserves a free and appropriate education,” Marrero said. “We’re fulfilling that duty.”
But the Trump administration’s rescinding of the sensitive location’s policy is making it difficult for the district to carry out that duty, he said.
The district filed the lawsuit a week after ICE and other federal agents raided apartment buildings in Denver and Aurora.
None of the raids took place in schools, but they disrupted classrooms in multiple ways, Marrero said.
At least four children who attend school at Place Bridge Academy were detained by agents in last week’s raids along with their families, he said.
An elementary-aged student told educators at Denver Green School that their parents told them to run from their home to school — a place they deemed safe — because of the raids, Marrero said.
“Who should start their day with that?” he said, adding, “That’s not how we should start our day and that’s definitely not how a student should start their day.”
ICE activity at Cedar Run Apartments, which is minutes from multiple Denver schools, caused five DPS buses to be re-routed and prevented them from picking up students, according to the district.
The fear that schools will be targeted in Trump’s deportation plans is also causing students in the Denver metro to miss school. Schools located less than two miles from Cedar Run experienced drops in attendance last week, according to DPS data reviewed by The Denver Post.
Place Bridge Academy had 87% of students show up to school on Feb. 5, the day of the raids, which was down from 92% the previous day.
McMeen Elementary School had only 74% of pupils attend class on Feb. 6, the day after the raids, and 77% of students attend on Feb. 7. By comparison, 84% of McMeen’s students attended school the day before the raids, data showed.
A third school, Ashley Elementary, saw attendance fall below 70% last week because of the raids, data showed.
Similarly, attendance in Aurora Public Schools dropped to under 79% districtwide on Jan. 30 after news spread that ICE had planned raids in the city for that day. By comparison, the district recorded 89% of students were in attendance the previous day, according to the most recent district data available.
DPS school board President Carrie Olson said she met with teachers and staff at schools affected by the raids and they shared how they’ve built trust with students’ families.
But now, Olson said, those families no longer feel like school is a safe place for their children.
“And scared children can’t learn,” she said.
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