Jennifer Cortez stood outside an elementary and middle school in East Los Angeles, carrying a sign while greeting her students and their families on the first day of classes.
“This is a safe space for immigrants,” the teacher’s red sign with white and yellow lettering said.
As summer comes to an end, more than 500,000 students in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest district, began a new school year Thursday with concerns and fear amid the ongoing immigration raids, and only a few days after a 15-year-old boy was detained outside one of the district’s high schools.
Parents like Anna Bermudez and her husband arrived at Brooklyn Avenue School with their children and noticed many parents were absent compared to previous years.
“It sucks, and it’s horrible and heartbreaking,” said Anna Bermudez, whose son attends eighth grade at the school. “It should be a happy day, and bringing our kids to school feeling safe. But the fact that you don’t feel safe, even dropping them off, you know? It’s very emotional.”
While immigration agents have not detained anyone inside a school, Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Alberto Carvalho has acknowledged the families’ trepidations and announced the district will offer strengthened safety measures, expanded mental health resources and free legal resources for families.
“Our schools are safe spaces, I guarantee it. No one will have entry into our schools without a judicial order. We will protect our kids, we will protect our communities,” Carvalho told reporters Thursday while visiting 24th Street Elementary School.
Increased immigration raids started as the school year was coming to an end this past spring and continued through the summer. Shortly before classes resumed in Los Angeles this week, enforcement actions took place outside a school.
Nathan Mejia, a 15-year-old with special needs, was pulled from the passenger seat of his mother’s car and handcuffed by federal immigration agents outside Arleta High School in northern Los Angeles on Monday, CNN affiliate KCBS reported.
Carvalho confirmed the boy was detained and noted he was released after a bystander intervened in the case of “mistaken identity.”
“This is the exact type of incident that traumatizes our communities; it cannot repeat itself,” the superintendent said in a Monday news conference.
In a statement to KCBS, Customs and Border Protection officials denied allegations that immigration agents targeted the school and said they were searching for a Salvadoran national with “prior criminal convictions in the broader vicinity” of the high school.
Nathan’s mother, Andreina Mejia, told KCBS the agents showed her a picture of a person who resembled her son, but it wasn’t actually him.
“So they were like, ‘We’re looking for somebody. Your son looks like somebody.’ and they showed me the picture and I’m like, ‘That’s not my son,’” she said.
After being handcuffed in front of onlooking students and parents, Nathan, who is a US citizen, doesn’t want to live in Los Angeles anymore, he told KCBS.
“I cannot sleep or anything,” he told KCBS.
School officials said they have been working to “protect and defend” students and families as they plan their return to classes, highlighting the launch of the “We Are One” campaign, which offers resources for “all students and families, regardless of immigration status.”
Earlier this week, Carvalho also said he urged immigration authorities not to conduct enforcement activity within a two-block radius around schools, starting an hour before the school day begins and until one hour after classes let out, the Associated Press reported.
The superintendent said that while staffers and district police officers cannot interfere with immigration enforcement and do not have jurisdiction beyond school property, they have had conversations with federal agents parked in front of schools that resulted in them leaving.
The district has also partnered with local law enforcement in some cities, forming a “rapid response” network to disseminate information about the presence of federal agents, Carvalho said.
“We want no one to stay home as a result of fears,” he assured in the news conference Monday.
Teachers plan to stand up for their students
Like school administrators, teachers expressed their commitment to protect students and their families.
Cortez, the teacher at Brooklyn Avenue School, said she believes every child in their district has the right to the education offered there, “no matter what.”
“We want to make sure that everyone is getting the education that they deserve. We want to make sure that they don’t miss school, that they’re here, that they know they’re welcome,” Cortez told CNN. “We want to teach everybody.”
In April, administrators at two elementary schools denied entry to officials from the Department of Homeland Security, the AP reported.
“It’s scary for the children,” said a teacher from a nearby elementary school, dropping off her own children at Brooklyn Avenue. “They see these ICE agents coming in, all covered up, with their face and all, and it’s scary for the students, and it’s a shame that they have to experience this.”
The teacher, who has been an educator for 20 years, said she has never seen immigration raids unfolding the way they have been this year, but her priority hasn’t changed.
“As teachers, our priority is keeping the children safe, and we’re not going to let them come and bother our parents, or bother our students,” the teacher said. “Our responsibility and our priorities are our students, and we’re going to be there – whatever it takes.”
