This article seems a little bit “off track”: with so many pressing issues, everyday challenges, and people’s rights under attack, talking about school boards might seem obsolete. Still, I think, it’s just the right time for this topic. Since I arrived in the US, I have been fascinated with how the American school system works. I think it is deeply under-appreciated by those who were born and raised here and think that any other country in the world provides better education. I maintain that the best thing about American schools is the civic values they teach, and how they help the children of newcomers become American citizens, regardless of their actual legal status.
I have several blog posts in drafts, which are just copies of articles from different Chicago newspapers. Usually, there are not that many of them in my blog, but these are unusual times, and I want to keep them for history.
The one below is from lst weeks’ Sun Times:
Members of the military are required to follow constitutional orders and disobey unconstitutional orders. But two members from Illinois see gray areas in the deployment of forces in the Chicago area to assist immigration agents.
National Guard members Dylan Blaha, left, and Demi Palecek attend a protest outside the ICE detention facility in Broadview on Friday. Blaha is running for Congress, and Palecek is running for state representative; both are Democrats.
Hundreds of National Guard members sent to Illinois by the Trump administration remain in a holding pattern following a federal judge’s order last week barring them from being deployed onto the streets of Chicago.
As some 500 military troops wait in limbo for the courts to decide where and how they can be sent into duty among civilians, two active Illinois National Guard members and one who is retired spoke to the Chicago Sun-Times about what they would do in the event they were activated.
Active-duty members are normally prohibited from speaking to the news media, but Dylan Blaha and Demi Palecek, who are both running for political office, said their views on the subject are already publicly known.
The third person who spoke out, Joe Prehm, left the National Guard in 2018 after serving 10 years. He is not restricted from expressing his views.
Palecek, 34, who is running for state representative as a Democrat in the 13th District, is a staff sergeant in the Illinois National Guard and has been a guard member for 12 years.
She said if she were called up to protect agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement she would not comply.
“Absolutely, I’d refuse. There’s no way,” Palecek said, adding she is also encouraging others in the National Guard to follow suit.
“I want all members to say no,” Palecek said. “This is against what we signed up for. We’re here for humanitarian things, we’re here to help and protect the people, not to be used and weaponized against our own communities to terrorize them.”
The issue is personal because her mother is from Mexico, she said.
U.S. service members take an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution. In addition, under Article 92 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice and the U.S. Manual for Courts-Martial, service members must obey lawful orders and disobey unlawful orders, according to a U.S. military website. Unlawful orders are those that clearly violate the U.S. Constitution, international human rights standards or the Geneva Conventions.
Blaha, a 32-year-old from the Champaign area who is a Democratic candidate in the 13th congressional District, has served in the Illinois National Guard for 11 years. He said refusing orders isn’t easy and may not be the ideal path to take.
“Just being told to go and stand in front of a federal building, I would recommend it’s better for these soldiers to stay there and follow what they can,” Blaha said. “If they do ever receive an order that seems like it crosses the line, then you stand up to it. But if you step aside, you might allow someone to take charge that will comply with everything.”
However, Blaha said the legality of an order is not always clear-cut.
“A soldier is obligated to disobey unlawful or illegal orders, but there’s a big gray area,” Blaha said. “You never find out what’s illegal or unlawful until after the fact, so a lot of it is a judgment call.”
Prehm, a 10-year veteran of the Illinois National Guard who ended his service seven years ago, agrees with Blaha.
“Maybe that’s why [President Donald Trump] sent Texas National Guard rather than Illinois, because with the Illinois Guard there may be a lot from Chicago,” Prehm said. “They may be less inclined to do something or help, while Texas has nothing to do with Chicago.”
Prehm, who was deployed to Kuwait and Iraq, said he would refuse to guard ICE agents if he were still in the National Guard.
“The National Guard should not be used to protect federal agents. That should be the job of other law enforcement,” Prehm said.
On Friday, Blaha and Palecek attended a protest near the ICE detention facility in Broadview.
Wearing sweatshirts in honor of journalists who have been killed in Gaza, they both said they were happy with the judge’s ruling.
“I’m glad that the judge found that they violated the 10th and 14th Amendment and the Posse Comitatus Act,” Blaha said.
“I think the biggest thing right now is that President Trump has threatened to invoke the Insurrection Act. I really hope he doesn’t and that we keep winning in the courts.”
The Insurrection Act gives the president power to send the military to states to put down public unrest and to support law enforcement.
Palecek said she had questions related to the fact that National Guard members are not being paid but would receive back pay once the government shutdown ends.
“They’re not getting paid, so are they going to chill here? Then we’ll have to pay for them to just chill here. It’s weird.”
The Sun Times article – see below. Proud for the State of Illinois 🙂
Yesterday, Gov. JB Pritzker signed the “Safe Schools for All Act” into law, which advocates say will help protect families. The law prohibits public schools from denying access to a free education based on immigration status. It also requires schools to have procedures for law enforcement requests to enter a building.
Immigrants, advocates and elected officials gather in the Belmont Cragin neighborhood on the Northwest Side to celebrate the signing of the Safe Schools for All law protecting the right of undocumented children to attend public schools.
When immigration enforcement operations in Chicago ramped up in January, a woman named Maria saw the chilling effect it had on the Belmont Cragin community firsthand.
As a parent-mentor at Lloyd Elementary in the Northwest Side neighborhood, she said some students expressed fears that they or their family members would be detained and deported by federal agents, perhaps on their way to school. Families considered leaving, she said.
The thought crossed her mind, too. Maria, whose last name isn’t being published to protect her identity, is undocumented, though her three children, including a third grader at Lloyd, are American citizens.
“I had a lot of fear,” she said.
That’s why she joined immigrant rights groups and elected officials Tuesday to celebrate Gov. JB Pritzker signing the “Safe Schools for All Act” into law, which advocates say will help protect families. The law prohibits public schools from denying any student access to a free education based on their immigration status or that of their parents.
“Now many families across the state can feel safer in their children’s public school,” Maria said. “Thanks to this new law we have more peace of mind that ICE is not welcome in our schools.”
The law also prohibits schools from disclosing or threatening to disclose information related to the immigration status of the student or an “associated person.” And it requires schools to develop procedures for reviewing and authorizing requests from law enforcement trying to enter a school.
In January, the Trump administration rescinded a Biden-era policy that protected certain places, such as schools and churches, from immigration enforcement actions.
The new law comes as students in Chicago Public Schools and suburban districts return to classes for a new school year.
State Rep. Lilian Jimenez, D-Chicago, and State Sen. Karina Villa, D-West Chicago, were lead sponsors of the bill. It strengthens at the state level protections that already existed at the federal level but feel tenuous under the current administration, they said. In 1982, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Plyler v. Doe that states cannot deny students a free public education on account of their immigration status.
But that hasn’t stopped some states. Earlier this year, Tennessee tried to pass a bill allowing public schools to refuse enrollment to children without legal immigration status. The effort failed after pushback from advocates and community members.
“All of these students, all of these teachers, all of our parents across the state of Illinois know that they have a safe school today, yesterday, tomorrow and we will stand up to this administration every single time,” Villa said.
Jimenez said her family of immigrants and many others see education as a path to success, which is why it’s important to make school buildings “sanctuaries” for them.
“Children need to be in school — and parents shouldn’t be afraid of going to school — because that’s a place where we can help children succeed so our community can succeed,” Jimenez said, noting Monday was the first day back for Chicago Public Schools.
CPS policy does not allow Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents into school facilities unless they have a criminal judicial warrant signed by a federal judge. The district also does not share student records with ICE or any other federal representative without a court order or parental consent.
In a recent article in Time Magazine, Diana Frank discusses the increasing lifespan and how the healthspan is not keeping pace with it – a topic I have been thinking about frequently lately.
During his speech at the World Refugee Day rally in Chicago on Tuesday, Mayor Brandon Johnson said pretty much “We will do everything to defend our Constitution from President Trump.” Not exactly those words, but very close, which is both ironic and sad.
Like this article states, “Implying it should be the standard for all because it is the way it “always” was, however, is wrong—literally, and because it holds everyone back from their full potential: both women and men.”
Hettie's Reflections 