When Bucks County School Districts Actually Need to Allow ICE Agents Inside Schools
Editor Cyril Mychalejko wrote in his January 26th article Central Bucks Community Grapples with the Specter of ICE Raids at Local Schools, “The school district, if it wants to follow federal law, no matter how unjust and immoral, has their hands tied…”
Presidential Executive Orders and Memos do not legally and constitutionally countermand laws that already protect undocumented students in Pennsylvania. The federal law Family Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) of 1974 prohibits disclosure of a student’s personally identifiable information without parental consent to anyone with very few exceptions including ICE agents, unless a judicial order or a lawfully issued subpoena is presented to school officials.
In addition, the 1982 Supreme Court case Plyler v. Doe, affirms that the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees all school age children a free appropriate public education regardless of immigration status. This decision is reflected in PA education law and clarified in a PA Department of Education Basic Education Circular Q and A, stating that a district may not inquire into a student’s or a student’s parents’ immigration status as a condition of enrollment or at any other time:
The language is quite explicit:
May a school district or a charter school inquire into the immigration status of a child?
No. School districts or charter schools may never ask the family for the child’s or parents’ immigration documents (during enrollment or at any other time).
At present, FERPA is the law of the land and Plyler v. Doe has not been overturned, so it is illegal for ICE agents to demand that school officials cooperate in allowing them to remove students from school without following the existing requirements of federal and state law.
Lisa Irgang, Elkins Park
The Importance of Pennsylvania’s 2025 Judicial Elections
Roy Cohn, the mafia lawyer who nurtured Donald Trump’s contempt for the rule of law, once infamously stated, “Don’t tell me the law; tell me who the judge is.” This corrupt perspective served Trump well as he successfully kept himself out of jail by stacking the courts with unethical and partisan judges. On November 4th, Pennsylvania voters will have the opportunity to vote YES or NO on the retention of 3 Supreme Court justices, 1 Superior Court justice, and 1 Commonwealth justice. These justices have served Pennsylvania admirably for the last decade. As another justice recently said, “they have restored competence, honor, and ethics to our courts.”
Sadly, MAGA Republicans in Pennsylvania are currently plotting to deny the retention of these justices in order to run extreme MAGA candidates for those seats in 2026.
A Pennsylvania billionaire is already spending a small fortune priming voters to vote NO on retention. Elon Musk has also contributed $1 million to take out judges up for retention even hiring a full-time MAGA operative for this purpose. Undoubtedly, we will see a barrage of TV ads later this year in a MAGA smear campaign.
Sitting justices are considered non-partisan and will not have a party designation after their name on November’s ballot even though they were elected as Democrats.
It’s never too soon to inform voters of MAGA’s anti-democratic efforts to stack our courts. This fall, vote YES to retain Justices David Wecht, Kevin Dougherty, Christine Donahue, Alice Beck Dubow and Michael Wojcik!
George Polycranos, Port Matilda
