The National Education Association (NEA), the largest teachers’ union in the United States, has been promoting student walkouts in opposition to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activities.
The union has openly sent emails and distributed materials encouraging student participation in nationwide anti-ICE disruptions. According to an NEA email titled “Hold ICE Accountable and Prioritize Student, Community Safety,” the union stated that ICE “will bring their brutality to other states unless we act.”
The email urges recipients to contact members of Congress using a provided form letter that demands limitations on ICE’s authority.
In addition, the NEA’s website features signup options for alerts on the issue and includes fundraising appeals. Additionally, the site contains statements calling for the removal of ICE from “communities.”
Distributed materials suggest that ICE routinely enters schools to detain students, though reports indicate that ICE has not conducted raids in schools across the country.
“ICE does not belong in our schools or our communities,” NEA President Becky Pringle said in a press release. She further described ICE’s actions as “traumatizing students, sabotaging communities, and undermining the basic promise that schools are safe places to learn.”
Pringle then called for ICE and other federal enforcement officers to stay out of public schools, hospitals, and places of worship.
Efforts from the NEA and other education groups have resulted in dozens of school walkouts in communities across the country, with more planned in coming weeks.
In one example, a Boston school teacher uploaded a video of first-grade students parading in the classroom with anti-ICE signs, according to a report from MassDailyNews. The video — which was posted to social media without parental permission — shows students chanting “No Donald Trump” as they marched around the classroom.
In Ventura, California, Cabrillo Middle School supported a school-wide walkout in support of pro-immigrant causes, according to a parent who posted about it on social media.
POLITICAL VIOLENCE: Atlanta-area Langston Hughes High School held an “ICE walkout” featuring students who can barely read or write (only 15% are proficient at math) hurled taxpayer-funded laptops and wrecked the school. pic.twitter.com/KDUT5lscj2
— @amuse (@amuse) February 1, 2026
These activities have faced criticism from Republican lawmakers and officials, including Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. “Our kids are not pawns for political activism. Education, not indoctrination,” the governor announced in a statement, adding that public school teachers who encourage leftist political activities in the state will face consequences.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott warned that teachers could have their pay docked if they permitted students to walk out for anti-ICE protests.
Anti-ICE protests at schools throughout the country are expected to continue, however. This past Thursday, students at Upper Darby high school, a suburb of Philadelphia, participated in a walkout that was attended by local Democrat political leaders.
Additional walkouts are planned in neighboring districts ahead of suspected increased immigration enforcement operations in Pennsylvania.
