What would AP's 'immigrant student enrollment' story look like if it wasn't so biased and incomplete?
By Gary Abernathy
Far-left media wrings their hands over laws being upheld instead of celebrating the chance for schools to get better
The Associated Press was at one time, long, long ago, the gold standard for dispassionate, dry, factual reporting, a style based in part on good journalism and in part an acknowledgement of the fact that its stories were carried by thousands of news outlets across the U.S. and around the world.
Sticking to a “Dragnet” style (look it up, kids) of “just-the-facts” reporting helped the AP avoid alienating readers from various parts of the country, whether residing in the most liberal coastal enclaves or the most conservative Midwest or Southern states.
Those days are long gone. The AP’s leadership a few years ago decided to compete with the New York Times as the most far-left, opinionated news organization in the world, spurred on by the mere existence of Donald J. Trump to become part of the Trump resistance and devote itself to producing a daily deluge of stories designed to portray Trump, his policies and his voters in the harshest possible light.
A story this week on immigration and public schools offers a perfect example of the organization’s biased approach. The AP has long offered story after story about the “plight” of immigrants, seldom — like most leftwing news sites — distinguishing between legal and illegal immigrants.
This week, the AP presented a story on the dwindling presence of the children of illegal immigrants in our public schools — and presented it as though it was nothing but a horrible turn of events. Written by AP reporters Kate Payne, Bianca Vazquez Toness and Gisela Salomon, the story offers a perfect example of the bias that exists across nearly all far-left — formerly mainstream — news organizations, especially when covering anything related to Trump.
Let’s dissect it section by section, first showing in bold how AP reported things, followed by commentary on how the story could have been presented with more balance and honesty, and even some examples of suggested alternative reporting (at no charge).
“From Miami to San Diego, schools around the U.S. are seeing big drops in enrollment of students from immigrant families. In some cases, parents have been deported or voluntarily returned to their home countries, driven out by President Donald Trump’s sweeping immigration crackdown. Others have moved elsewhere inside the U.S.”
First, as noted, the AP does not specify that it’s reporting on “illegal immigrant families.” This is a major failure of the mainstream media in general, conflating illegal and legal immigrants. The phrase “driven out by President Donald Trump’s sweeping immigration crackdown” is laughably pejorative. How ‘bout, “finally held to account for knowingly moving to and living in the country illegally.”
“In many school systems, the biggest factor is that far fewer families are coming from other countries. As fewer people cross the U.S. border, administrators in small towns and big cities alike are reporting fewer newcomer students than usual.”
Maybe this: “The crackdown on illegal border crossings has shockingly revealed just how many children of illegal immigrants have been attending public school in the U.S.”
“In Miami-Dade County Public Schools, about 2,550 students have entered the district from another country so far this school year — down from nearly 14,000 last year, and more than 20,000 the year before that. School board member Luisa Santos, who attended district schools herself as a young immigrant, said the trend is ‘a sad reality.’”
The numbers are, again, astounding. But the AP doesn’t focus on the stunningly high enrollment of children from parents in the U.S. illegally and placed in our public schools. Instead, it quotes a school board member — “who attended district schools herself as a young immigrant” — calling the downward trend “a sad reality.” Sad? This is great news for students from families who live here legally, pay taxes, and wonder why classrooms are often so overcrowded.
Pupil funding highly sought
“Collectively, the enrollment declines in Miami-Dade erased about $70 million from the district’s annual budget, forcing administrators to scramble to cover the unexpected shortfall.”
How is this possible? Why does the enrollment decline cost the district so much money? Because it’s money they should never have had in the first place.
“The drops in immigrant students add to strains on enrollment at many traditional public schools, which have seen overall numbers dip due to demographic changes and students opting for alternatives like private schools and homeschooling. Despite the need for English instruction and social support, the newcomers in some districts have helped to buoy enrollment and bring critical per-pupil funding in recent years.”
Catch that? The “newcomers,” as the AP has decided to call the children of illegal immigrants, “have helped to buoy enrollment and bring critical per-pupil funding…” Does everyone understand what “per-pupil funding” means? It’s the tax dollars distributed to school districts. The AP seems to think it’s a problem that schools are losing funding that, if our laws had been properly enforced all along, they never would have had in the first place. At no point in the story does the AP even touch on the cost to taxpayers.
For the record, to do what AP didn’t, let’s be clear that, as one school finance resource I found describes it, per-pupil funding is “a system in which the funding available to a school is based on the overall enrollment of the school. In its simplest form it is an assigned dollar amount allocated per-pupil and multiplied by enrollment to determine a total budget allocation.”
Many states have their own unique formulas, but in a nutshell, it usually boils down to the more students, the more funding from either federal or state tax dollars, or from property taxes. Losing the children of illegal immigrants undoubtedly causes schools to lose tax dollars. Accumulating the children of illegal immigrants — “newcomers,” in AP-speak — causes schools to gain tax dollars.
The AP story goes on to portray illegal immigrants as a boon to the local economy, and then, of course, highlights in heart-wrenching prose a case where children are at first separated from their deported mother, placed with a friend, “Edna,” and then, eventually, put on a plane to reunite with their mother. But the AP had its own spin.
“In the weeks that followed, Edna stayed home with two younger kids and got their five older siblings on the bus each day to attend Palm Beach County public schools, where enrollment has fallen by more than 6,000 students this year. One day in September, all seven children boarded a plane to Guatemala to be reunited with their mom, leaving behind neighborhood friends, band practices, and the only life they had ever known.”
“Neighborhood friends.” “Band practices.” The only thing missing is, “and their little kitten, Scruffy.”
Maybe report it this way: “Despite the fact that their mother had come to the U.S. illegally, U.S. taxpayers and a generous government program allowed the children to be provided with a free flight to join their mother in Guatemala.”
For AP, ICE agents are villains
The story goes on to note various school districts around the country that lost “newcomer” students due to the enforcement of our immigration laws, with the AP choosing to describe it as Trump’s “crackdown.” It quotes Daniel Mojica, a school official, commenting about the “fear” caused by “masked” ICE agents.
“Over the summer, 152 newcomers signed up for Chelsea Public Schools, compared to 592 new-to-country students the previous summer. Some are also picking up and leaving. … Mojica said a greater share of students leaving — roughly a quarter — are returning to their native countries. He attributes that partly to the presence of masked Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers walking the city’s streets. ‘You can feel the fear in the air,’ he said.”
Maybe report it this way: “The reduction in students of illegal families will mean more attention paid to students from families who are citizens and living here legally. Eventually, ICE agents might no longer have to wear masks to protect their identities, since fewer people will have the motivation to ‘dox’ them and endanger the agents’ and their families’ lives by posting their identities and home addresses online.”
Naturally, the AP ends with another heart-wrenching tale.
“Natacha, a parent who moved with her family to California after leaving Venezuela, said she tries to avoid going out in public, but continues sending her daughters to school. Natacha, who asked to only be identified by her first name because she fears immigration enforcement, said she braces herself as she drives the girls home each afternoon, scanning the road behind her in case another car is following hers. ‘I entrust myself to God,’ she said.”
How ‘bout putting it this way: “Natacha, who we agreed to protect from law enforcement by withholding her last name despite AP policy to identify people by their full name and age, is hiding from the law, and teaching her children to do the same, instructing them to keep their eyes peeled in case the police are following them. Meanwhile, she expects U.S. taxpayers — who pray to God to help them feed and clothe their own families each week — to continue educating her kids.”
Children victims of bad choices
Everyone can agree that children are the victims — but not of President Trump and the enforcement of U.S. immigration laws. They are the victims of their parents’ bad choices to move to the U.S. illegally, to continue living here illegally, and to help schools inflate their budgets through the enrollment of the children of illegal immigrants.
Even worse than the completely one-sided narrative of the story from start to finish is the lack of even one cursory nod to another point of view. There is not one line quoting a Trump administration official defending the enforcement of our laws. There’s not a single quote from someone who might believe that cracking down on illegal immigration is a good thing. Not. One. Here’s the link again; I encourage you to check out the story for yourself.
In addition to overall far-left media bias, here’s the cost to taxpayers revealed by the story that the AP ignored: For years — likely decades — millions of students from the families of illegal immigrants have been inflating enrollment in countless schools across the U.S.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, fiscal spending per pupil in the U.S. averaged nearly $16,000 in 2022, the most recent year with reliable data — “the largest year-to-year percentage increase in over two decades.” When it comes to children of illegal immigrants, make your best guess of how many we’re talking about and do the math.
Not all states are equal. The per-pupil spending ranged from a high of nearly $30,000 per pupil in New York to a low of about $9,500 per pupil in Utah. The national average of revenue breaks down as 13.6 percent from federal sources, 43.7 percent from state sources and 42.7 percent from local sources.
Yes, many illegal immigrants pay taxes, including income taxes. But a study by the Federation for American Immigration Reform found that “approximately $31 billion is received from illegal aliens in taxes, only 17 percent of the costs they create.”
Budgetary issues, crowded classrooms, teacher shortages etc. have been plaguing public education for decades. By finally enforcing immigration laws that have been on the books for decades, enrollment in public schools might find a level that is more reasonable and affordable, and lead to a classroom environment where fewer parents who are legal residents are motivated to withdraw their students from public schools and enter them into private schools or engage in home schooling.
We are a nation of immigrants. We should support making legal immigration easier, so that the children of immigrants can attend school here without fear of their families being suddenly deported and their lives uprooted.
The stories of some illegal immigrants are sad, their reasons for coming to the U.S. often relatable. But we have both a right and a responsibility to vet people who come to live in our country, and to make sure immigration is happening in an orderly fashion. We should insist on a requirement to learn our common language and assimilate into our society as patriotic Americans, not hyphenated Americans.
Coming to the U.S. through avenues outside immigration applications and procedures prescribed by law is illegal, aside from legitimate asylum assertions, which are rarely found to be legitimate compared to how often they’re claimed.
Until now, our government merely winked at illegal immigration, refusing to enforce our laws aggressively or to secure our border, leading to a false sense of security among families here illegally. Finally, the enforcement of our laws is happening.
Despite far-left media outlets like the Associated Press painting a picture to the contrary, children are suffering not from the enforcement of our laws, but from the consequences of their parents’ choices to ignore the law and sneak into the country illegally. Those are the kind of dry, dispassionate facts that the AP was once noted for reporting.
Class size is the second largest predictor of student success, second only to parental involvement (which itself is made even more difficult in overcrowded classrooms). Despite knowing this, education administrators are happy about crowded classrooms because of the per-pupil money.
In addition, the resulting teacher shortages mean more burnout and earlier retirement, leading to a pipeline of inexperienced teachers straight from college to the worst performing schools. Very often they get a hiring bonus or start at a higher rate, which understandably creates resentment among teachers who have been there for years. Vicious cycle, rinse and repeat...
The teachers who do manage to succeed quickly learn that there's far more money to be made in administration, which results in an even smaller percentage of talent among the teaching staff.
The story seems to be that schools have fewer immigrant children, resulting in less revenue, and that we have fewer immigrants in the United States overall. Those are the facts the AP reports. Whether the children were legal or illegal immigrants, how do the schools and the AP know? And how do you know the children aren't or weren't in the United States legally, and how do you determine it? Some students are likely legal, some illegal. In June 2025, the Department of Homeland Security directed about 500,000 individuals who entered the U.S. through humanitarian parole to "self-deport" after their legal status was revoked. Are you suggesting that children in general, who have little or no say in where they are living, shouldn't be in school?