Sen. Lena Gonzalez. (Photo: sd33.senate.ca.gov)
Bill to Block Immigration Enforcement Officers Nearby Schools Passes Senate Committee
GOP Senators torn on support for SB 48
By Evan Symon, April 4, 2025 3:59 am
A bill to restrict local educational agencies and local law enforcement agencies from cooperating with federal immigration enforcement officers, and bar immigration authorities from entering schools unless they have a valid warrant or court order, was passed in the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday with a 6-1 vote.
The vote on the bill, Senate Bill 48, came after only a few weeks following a major amendment to the bill that made it less restrictive than the original version. Originally, bill author Senator Lena Gonzalez (D-Long Beach) said that the bill would specifically prohibit school districts, county offices of education, or charter schools and their personnel from granting a United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer, or other federal official engaging in immigration related investigation or enforcement, permission to access a school campus without a judicial warrant.
In addition, SB 48 would prohibit California law enforcement agencies from collaborating with, or providing any information about a pupil, pupil’s family and household, school employee, or teacher in writing, verbally, on in any other manner, to immigration authorities regarding proposed or currently underway immigration enforcement actions when the actions could be or are taking place within a radius of one mile of any school site.
However, with concerns over loopholes and the bill leaving much up to interpretation, SB 48 was heavily amended before the Committee vote late last month. The amended SB 48 removed the mile radius for officers and made it clear what the process was for immigration officers, with a valid judicial warrant or court order, to enter a school site. The new amendment also deemphasized ICE and instead said “immigration authority”.
With the amendment clearing up the issues around the bill, SB 48 received back from Democrats as well as some Republicans. This was seen on the Committee vote on Wednesday when Senator Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh (R-Yucaipa) voted in favor of the bill with 5 Democrats, while Senator Steven Choi (R-Irvine) was the sole vote against it.
Bogh explained her decision on Wednesday, saying that while SB 48 was a “good bill,” schools are not allowed by law to get information on if students are illegal immigrants or not.
“I just want to make sure that we have the correct information out in public because there is a lot of fear being promoted, and it has to stop,” said Bogh. “I can see why the bills are being introduced in order to protect and give that security, but that is the law that is currently already in place. To promote this notion that our students could be in peril within the school districts, I’ll leave it to your interpretations.”
SB 48 moves up in Senate
Meanwhile, Gonzalez stressed that the bill was more to do with a right to education and not have a disrupted educational experience because of immigration enforcement agents entering schools.
“The U.S. Supreme Court has long established that the Constitution guarantees a right to education regardless of immigration status, and until recently, the federal government had treated these sensitive spaces as safe zones,” Gonzalez said. “Immigration actions near schools have a chilling effect on school attendance, increased learning loss and harms student mental health.”
Despite Gonzales’ reasonings, SB 48 has been seen as one of several “Trump Proof” bills entering the legislature this year to combat against President Donald Trump’s new ICE guidelines. It has even received the backing of California Department of Education (CDE) State Superintendent and 2026 Governor candidate Tony Thurmond, who noted that immigration authorities could wind up costing schools money as a result if SB 48 isn’t there to keep authorities in check.
“We know that the fearmongering happening across our nation has disruptive impacts on children in our immigrant families, and it could cost California schools millions of dollars,” said Thurmond on Wednesday.
“All California children deserve safe school environments that prioritize student learning, regardless of immigration status,” added Gonzalez. “As Chair of the California Latino Legislative Caucus, I’m proud to be partnering with Superintendent Tony Thurmond to author this important legislation, which will prevent disruptions to student learning, keep children in school, and prevent families from being torn apart.”
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August 21, 2024 -
The implication of this dishonest bill SB 48 is that it will solve a problem that, as far as anyone knows, doesn’t even exist in the first place. Notice that the Dem-Marxist legislators such as Lena Gonzalez and her ilk are screaming “it’s for the children, it’s for the children!” again. Gee, wouldn’t it have been nice if the Dem supermajority legislature (and the governor) had thought of student welfare before they locked down students, masked and vaccinated them for NO GOOD REASON WHATSOEVER, and shut down their minds and their futures FOR YEARS with their Covid fake hysteria? Wouldn’t it also have been nice if they had thought of protecting children and families before they decided they were going to find a way to brainwash and “counsel” young underage students that a psychological or emotional problem of ANY kind indicated without a moment’s hesitation that they are probably boys in girls’ bodies? After which the school ships them off to the TransYouth Dept of L.A. County Children’s Hospital for super-quick and without vetting access to sterilizing cross-hormone injections and Frankenstein-style mutilating transgender surgeries, which guarantees these confused and vulnerable students a lifetime of hellish medical problems and never-ending dependency upon the Transgender Medical Industrial Complex?
But noooooo….. So please spare me from your protestations of concern, Dem-Marxist legislators.
And PLEASE, Republican legislators, DO NOT fall for this trick. Just say NO, this bill isn’t necessary.
Yes, Showandtell. A Republican in the legislature should write an opposing bill that would require the state of California to support efforts by ICE and the federal government to deport any illegal alien who has been convicted of a felony while in the US, The Dem/Marxists would kill the bill, putting another black mark on their record.
100% Fed Up!
And you can read that with its two meanings: As a reply to you (which it is) or as a statement of frustration and contempt directed at our Dem-Marxist CA politicians (which it also is).
Democrat Senate Majority Leader Lena Gonzalez needs to know that the U.S. Constitution does NOT explicitly guarantee a right to an education. A Supreme Court decision in 1982 (Plyler v. Doe) established that undocumented students have a constitutional right to receive a free, public K-12 education regardless of their immigration status or that of their parents. Just as the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade eliminating the federal right to abortion, the 1982 Plyler v. Doe needs to be overturned.
Democrat Senate Majority Leader Lena Gonzalez also needs to know that the federal government is responsible for enforcing immigration laws in the United States, as established by the Constitution. The Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution generally means that federal laws take precedence over state laws, and the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the federal government’s jurisdiction over immigration law, overruling attempts by state legislatures to single out immigrants.
Katy Grimes recently had an article about how Senator Lena Gonzalez (aka “Ms. Busybody Gonzalez”) sent the Los Angles Dodgers a letter demanding they end their sponsorship deals with oil companies because she claimed that “Big Oil continues to engage in climate denial.” Never mind that Chicano lowrider culture has a significant presence and history in her 33rd Senate District that encompasses Southeast LA and Long Beach. They’d probably laugh hysterically at Ms. Busybody Gonzalez trying to claim that their gas vehicles have caused climate change along with the LA fires?
No doubt Democrat Senator Lena “Busybody” Gonzalez is getting well paid from some nefarious sources to push for open borders along with the climate change scam?
Senator Lena Gonzalez’s bio indicates that she was born in Torrance, California, the daughter of immigrants from Aguascalientes, Mexico. Is she aware that Mexico’s Constitution also does not explicitly provide for free education for illegal migrants? Under Mexico’s Law on Migration, illegal migrants may access education and health services provided they meet applicable requirements such as permission to work in Mexico temporarily and other conditions set forth by the Mexican government. Maybe the U.S. needs a similar law that has such requirements on illegal migrants?
Love it, TJ.
Why, why, why do we have to have a state run by these idiot Democrats? It takes a special kind of stupid to think having illegal immigrant gang members, such as the killers of MS-13, invade a school like a cancer is a good idea.
All of these illegal immigrants need to go. All of them. That’s what Americans voted for. They want them all out, not just criminals that have been caught so far.
The article states, “State Superintendent and 2026 Governor candidate Tony Thurmond, who noted that immigration authorities could wind up costing schools money as a result if SB 48 isn’t there to keep authorities in check.”
umm…
California’s legislature needs to educate the public and themselves on the United States Constitution- focusing the role of the state in complying with Congress in national security matters. It is time to hold a press conference to make certain everyone is on the same Constitutional page. Who holds the ultimate authority on national security matters? Is it the State or is it the Executive Branch of the United States of America?
Creating and enforcing immigration laws are recognized as primarily federal responsibilities according to the U.S. Constitution. This means states and local governments are generally preempted from creating their own immigration laws (SB 48). The Supreme Court’s jurisprudence reflects that Congress retains broad power to regulate immigration and that the Court will accord substantial deference to the government’s immigration policies, particularly those that implicate matters of national security. The Constitution vests the President with executive power, including the duty to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed”. Meaning…
The President is responsible for ensuring that laws passed by Congress are carried out, which involves overseeing the federal bureaucracy and the agencies that implement and enforce those laws.
Under the Supremacy Clause of the U.S. Constitution, federal law is the supreme law of the land.
Another aspect of this dishonest bill proposal, SB 48, from Sen Lena Gonzalez is that it is likely a response to fear of deportation — whether such deportation is likely to happen or not —- in the illegal immigrant communities. The fear results in such children being kept home from school. And large groups of absent students results in the schools and districts not getting their precious ADA (Average Daily Attendance) money from the state.
Gonzalez’ bill may be an attempt to placate those families so that kids of illegals send their kids back to school and the school districts get as much ADA cash as they can.
No doubt in the meantime there is a larger fear of future public school district collapse from CA public school teachers, teachers unions, administrators, and staff that school districts with a majority of students whose parents are here illegally will lose all funding and close down if illegal alien families refuse to send their children to school, if the families are deported, or if the families “self-deport.”
What most people might not realize is these provisions are largely already in many school policies as this was already issued by CSBA in their model policies (BP 5145.13/AR 5145.13). So the bill is not really doing anything other than codifying what already exists administratively (but that does cement it more). I haven’t done a side by side; But from a process perspective, most schools are already doing this (or a version of this). See:
https://publications.csba.org/california-school-news/may-2018/ca-attorney-general-issues-guidance-regarding-public-school-immigration-enforcement/ and https://oag.ca.gov/sites/all/files/agweb/pdfs/bcj/school-guidance-model-k12.pdf
If the people behind this bill really care about the “safety of students” then they should be all for ICE agents entering schools to remove dangerous MS-13 and other gang members which is the main reason they are doing this. Its laws like this that make our schools even MORE unsafe (while at the same time they groom our children into gender confusion).