Migrant Kids Face ICE While Florida Lawmakers Skip Town for Recess
As immigrant students brace for raids in their schools, the state’s politicians head out for recess — offering platitudes while real fear grows in the classroom.
WASHINGTON — School can be scary. For many students, focusing in the classroom is a high order. Multiplication tables while your peers giggle, drop pencils, and pass notes — sucks. For most, though, a subpar school day ends with a return to home, safety, and family — things that usually make everything better.
Classrooms are cathartic... until they’re not. Millions of American students are being deprived of that respite. With the fear of mom, dad, grandma, or grandpa being systematically snatched up by ICE, the classroom has become less of a cocoon and more of a holding cell.
Now imagine walking home, your mind racing — not about homework, but whether your parents are gone. That’s a worry most Americans will never know. Since the beginning of Trump’s second term, fears like these have plagued immigrant youth. Children fear for their parents. Parents fear for their children. Educators fear for the future. Just ask one.
What Lawmakers Are Saying
Before coming to Congress, Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.) was an educator. She earned degrees in elementary education and later served as a principal before joining the House Committee on Education and the Workforce.
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Wilson is a sharp critic of Trump’s immigration policy. When pressed by Migrant Insider about how immigration enforcement affects classrooms, she cited deportation fears — whether for family members or students themselves — as a major issue.
“How are you gonna go to school and be educated with all that fear in your mind?” Wilson asked, echoing her party’s line. Her Republican colleagues haven’t strayed far from theirs, either.
Rep. Randy Fine (R-Fla.), also on the Education and Workforce Committee and a fellow member of the Florida delegation, told Migrant Insider, “If you’re here legally, you’ve got nothing to fear.”
When asked if ICE should be allowed in schools, Fine didn’t hesitate: “Yes. Illegal immigrants should go home.” Wilson vehemently disagreed: “ICE is not allowed in schools now and should not be ever.”
That claim appears to contradict current policy. A Trump executive order signed in January repealed Biden-era protections that had barred ICE from entering sensitive locations like schools and churches. Wilson’s stance also clashes with the Florida Department of Education’s pledge to support Trump’s immigration agenda, made shortly after that order was issued.
Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-FL). Photo by Logan Johnson.
Are Schools At Risk?
Students aren’t just afraid of ICE knocking at their front door. With the rollback of sensitive-location protections, some now fear agents may show up in classrooms.
No ICE raids have yet been reported on Florida campuses — but it’s legally possible, and immigrant advocates warn it could happen.
Florida is a leader in adopting 287(g) agreements, which allow local law enforcement to enforce federal immigration law. Many Florida campuses have school resource officers (SROs). If an SRO is part of a 287(g) program, they could, in theory, carry out immigration enforcement on school grounds.
Despite this legal pathway, Wilson downplays the threat: “I know police. I deal with police every day, and they’re not gonna do that. Not in Miami,” she said.
At least in her district, she’s likely right. While the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office is a 287(g) partner, Miami-Dade County Public Schools don’t use them for SROs. Instead, the school system runs its own police department, which hasn’t signed the agreement — nor filed to.
The same can’t be said for Broward County, just north of Wilson’s district. Broward County Public Schools source SROs from various departments, including the Broward County Sheriff’s Office — a 287(g) Task Force Model signatory, the most aggressive variant. It gives officers the power to detain and arrest individuals to assess immigration status.
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No such incidents have been reported in Broward, and the school district has pledged not to share student records with federal agents. Still, the possibility looms — fueling fear in immigrant communities.
Fear Thwarts Learning
Florida is home to the third-largest undocumented population in the U.S., with an estimated 1.2 million undocumented immigrants — 4.1% of the state’s population. More than 60,000 are of school age.
Research shows these students face deep mental and academic challenges. Deportation fears are tied to anxiety, depression, and suicidal ideation. Depression, in turn, predicts lower academic performance. The mere presence of ICE raids in a community has been shown to harm student mental health and achievement.
While Trump’s deportation machine roars, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is racing to turn the state into a laboratory for Trumpism. From the fast-tracked “Alligator Alcatraz” detention center in the Everglades to the creeping ICE-ification of local police, immigrant youth in Florida have a lot to fear — and not many lawmakers are willing to say it out loud.
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