DENVER — Denver Public Schools on Tuesday announced it had dropped its lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security that sought to block federal immigration agents from conducting raids at places like schools after President Trump vowed earlier this year to ramp up mass deportations nationwide.
The district sued the DHS in February to stop federal immigration enforcement officials from making arrests at “sensitive locations” such as schools, churches, and hospitals – policies that had been in place since 1993.
In their lawsuit, DPS claimed the change in federal immigration policy under the second Trump administration was hindering the district from fulfilling its mission to students and was forcing them to divert resources schools needed to prepare its staff in case of immigration arrests on DPS property.
In court, DPS officials argued a previous policy under former President Joe Biden provided some guardrails for immigrant families, while the newer policy wasn’t clear as to when immigration arrests would take place.
But in a rebuttal issued by DHS the same month, attorneys for the federal agency said the newer policy wasn't that much different from the one that was in place before Trump took office a second time.
Ultimately, a Trump-appointed federal judge in early March ruled against the district’s request for a preliminary injunction to block ICE from enforcing raids at schools, saying the district could not show that the harm DPS claimed to have incurred was due to the change in federal immigration policy under the Trump administration, but more so the result of widespread concerns about what that change could mean for immigrant families across the district.
District officials said Tuesday their lawsuit’s claim was moot after DHS published a newer policy and “admitted that the policy had not been fundamentally changed from the previous version.”
“This was another significant victory for DPS and school districts nationwide, as the Department of Homeland Security admitted in federal court that the policy had not been changed in a meaningful way and that schools remained protected as sensitive locations,” district officials said in a news release, adding that information that the policy wasn’t that much different under the Biden administration was “not previously known.”
The lawsuit against DHS was dismissed without prejudice, which gives DPS the opportunity to refile should immigration enforcement agents come onto school property or conduct enforcement activities near a school.
In a statement announcing the dismissal of their lawsuit, district officials said Tuesday the district would not hesitate to refile the lawsuit should circumstances change.
“Students cannot learn unless they feel safe and welcome in our schools,” a DPS spokesperson said. “We owe that to them.”
