On the campaign trail, President-elect Donald Trump promised to terminate an executive order made by President Obama, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), which gave undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children the right to stay if working or in school. Trump said in a recent interview with Time magazine that he’d “work something out” to somehow keep those protected by the order in the country, but some local schools aren’t taking any chances.
On Feb. 14, the Allan Hancock College board of trustees will vote on whether to accept a resolution from the college’s academic senate that would give certain protections to the college’s population of undocumented immigrants.
The resolution includes protections from being detained, questioned, or arrested by campus police based solely on suspected immigration status. It also calls for non-cooperation with federal authorities to create a registry of students based on religion, national origin, race, or sexual orientation.
Another stipulation would block the college from releasing student records, except in the case of a court order.
The recommendations are adopted from a statement made by Eloy Ortiz Oakley, the chancellor of the California Community Colleges, on Dec. 5, and come following Trump’s election—he takes the oath of office on Jan. 20.
Oakley’s statement mirrored the defiant tone that both of the state’s university systems struck when they, including Cal Poly, issued joint statements opposing the president-elect’s threat to end DACA. Most recently, on Jan. 10, Santa Maria Joint Union High School District’s board of trustees unanimously adopted similar protections for its undocumented students.
According to figures cited by the college and student groups, Hancock has about 400 undocumented students who attend the school under AB 540, state legislation passed in 2001 that allows them to pay in-state tuition fees under certain conditions.
Around campus, Trump’s name is getting the Lord Voldemort treatment—or “he who must not be named” from the Harry Potter series—because mere mention of his name could evoke a sense of ill will around campus.
“I just feel like there’s a lot of students in my classes who came to me and told me that they don’t feel safe now that Trump was elected,” 26-year-old photography student Liz Pompa told the Sun.
Pompa’s husband, an undocumented Hancock student, would be directly affected by the resolution.
While explicitly mentioned in Oakley’s statement, Trump’s name is omitted from the academic senate’s resolution, as well as in a declaration issued by the associated student body government in December.
This is intentional, said Marla Allegre, Hancock English faculty member and president of the academic senate, because the resolution is meant to be non-political.
“The desire was to emphasize unity and support for all students and avoid partisanship,” Allegre told the Sun.
Michael Huggins, a political science student and associated student body government president, wouldn’t point to a specific person, but told the Sun that the entire political landscape has become inflammatory.
“There was fear across the aisle, whether it’s individuals facing persecution or feeling threatened by the language that was heard in the election,” Huggins said.
Allegre is going as far as to also avoid using the term “sanctuary campus” when defining what Hancock will become if the resolution passes because of what the term can mean to some people.
“The negative historical connotations associated with the terms as a hiding place for criminals or ‘enemies of the state,’” Allegre wrote in an email to the Sun. “What the resolution reaffirms is already for the most part federal policy under the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s ‘sensitive locations’ provisions.”
Indeed, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) isn’t interested in deporting students—only those who “pose a threat to public safety and national security,” ICE spokeswoman Lori Haley told the Sun.
An ICE memo issued in 2011 stated that enforcement actions aren’t to take place in “sensitive locations,” such as schools and churches, except in certain circumstances, such as life-threatening emergencies.
However, colleges like Hancock that receive ICE’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification for foreign exchange students require site visits and data collection, which conflicts with a portion of the senate’s resolution.
The California Community Colleges’ board will vote on its version of a resolution on Jan. 17, but according to spokesman Paul Feist, it’s not binding across the state’s 113 community colleges, since each college is a public body with its own local leadership.
Instead, Oakley’s statement is meant to provide guidance should community colleges pass their own resolutions, Feist told the Sun.
Hancock hasn’t taken an official position, though at least one trustee has. Dan Hilker, newly elected to represent Area 2 encompassing the eastern side of Santa Maria to Cuyama, isn’t in favor of the resolution.
“I don’t think it’s a very wise thing to do,” Hilker told the Sun. “But then again, I’m just one voice on a board of five.”
Staff Writer David Minsky can be reached at dminsky@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Jan 19-26, 2017.