Just one month into 2026, immigration enforcement under the Trump administration is already upsetting daily life across the country, with devastating consequences for students, families, and schools. Sweeping ICE raids are tearing families apart, terrorizing communities, and transforming once-safe spaces into zones of fear, with people’s lives disrupted and, in some cases, violently taken.

Once considered safe havens, schools are increasingly becoming sites of fear and trauma. After the administration rescinded long-standing protections that shielded schools, churches, and hospitals from immigration enforcement, ICE raids have intensified and expanded. Agents have been seen circling school campuses and buildings, stalking school drop-off lines, and stopping school buses. In some cases, children have been directly targeted, but oftentimes, it’s a means to apprehend the parent.

For undocumented and mixed-status families, daily life has become a series of impossible choices: risk arrest and deportation by sending children to school or keep them home at the expense of their education.

According to an analysis by The Marshall Project, at least 3,800 children under 18, including 20 infants, have been detained since Trump took office. Some were taken from their homes, others from vehicles, and still others from classrooms and school grounds. In a new low, five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos was abducted while walking home from preschool in Minnesota, then used as bait to lure his father out of their house before both were transported to a detention facility in Texas. Liam was still wearing his droopy-eared rabbit knit hat and carrying his Spider-Man backpack.

These are not isolated incidents. They are the predictable result of an enforcement strategy rooted in fear, intimidation, and public spectacle, with devastating consequences for children, families, and school communities.

Policing, Immigration Enforcement, and Student Impact

For undocumented and mixed-status families, daily life has become a series of impossible choices: risk arrest and deportation by sending children to school or keep them home at the expense of their education.

Across the country, many families are choosing the latter. The result is rising absenteeism, worsening mental health, and fractured trust between schools and the communities they serve. Following immigration raids in California’s Central Valley, daily student absences increased by 22%. Similar patterns are emerging in Los Angeles Unified, Miami-Dade County, and Chicago Public Schools.

The cruel decisions being made by this administration will cause generational trauma to all children as students watch their families, classmates, and teachers being apprehended for seemingly no reason other than the color of their skin, their accent, or their last name. Students are experiencing chronic stress, anxiety, and emotional trauma, all of which undermine learning, development, and long-term outcomes. Even children who do not experience violent raids firsthand absorb fear through witnessing the horrors on news coverage, social media, and classroom conversations.

When schools become sites of surveillance rather than sanctuary, student learning, belonging, and opportunity all suffer. In some districts, schools have shifted to remote learning in an effort to protect families. But even staying home is no guarantee of safety, as ICE has been forcibly raiding residences without warrants or just cause. Immigration enforcement has expanded beyond major cities into smaller and less diverse states like Maine and New Hampshire, signaling that no community is exempt.

Undocumented Students’ Right to Education Is Under Threat

Undocumented children have a constitutional right to a free public education under the landmark 1982 Supreme Court decision Plyler v. Doe. Today, 1.8 million school-aged children benefit from this ruling, according to a report by Fwd.us. Yet five states, including Tennessee, Texas, Oklahoma, Idaho, and Indiana, are actively seeking to overturn it, as outlined in Project 2025. If successful, the consequences would be catastrophic.

Public schools would face enrollment declines, funding losses, and staffing shortages, particularly in states like California and Texas, which have large immigrant populations and use daily attendance in school funding formulas. And think of the long-term domino effect of students not finishing high school or graduating college: America would lose hundreds of thousands of future workers, shrinking the labor force and weakening the economy. Fwd.us estimates that dismantling Plyler would reduce workforce participation by 750,000 people and shrink the U.S. economy by more than $1 trillion over time.

But even without legal changes, today’s enforcement practices are already producing these effects by pushing students out of classrooms, destabilizing schools, and weakening entire communities.

A Moral, Educational, and Economic Crisis

This approach to immigration enforcement represents more than a policy shift. It is a moral failure that undermines children’s safety, destabilizes families, and erodes trust in public institutions.

When it comes to the amount of damage inflicted onto families, students, and the U.S. education system by this administration, the list goes on and on. At EdTrust, we call this the Great American Heist, the systematic dismantling of public systems that families rely on to survive, learn, and succeed. Like healthcare and housing, education shapes whether families can feel safe, stable, and hopeful about the future. When students are afraid to show up to school, the consequences ripple across generations.

This moment demands action.

What You Can Do

1. Contact your lawmakers. Demand protections for immigrant families, the preservation of Plyler v. Doe, and clear safeguards that keep schools free from immigration enforcement.
2. Donate to frontline organizations providing legal aid, housing, mental health services, and direct assistance to impacted families, including Stand With Minnesota and Monarca.
3. Share Know Your Rights resources. The ACLU and the Immigrant Legal Resource Center offer multilingual videos and printable materials to help families understand and assert their rights.
4. Stay engaged and speak out. Counter misinformation, uplift student-centered narratives, and advocate for humane policies that place children’s safety and dignity first.

Every child deserves to learn without fear. Every family deserves to live without terror. And every community deserves schools that are places of safety, belonging, and opportunity.

Every American has the right and the responsibility to take a stand. The voices of dissent are growing louder. Will you add yours?

Photo by Colin Lloyd on Unsplash