Latin student association petitions Towson to remove ICE from career fair

By Sarah Sternhagen, Editor-in-Chief

The Towson University Latin American Student Association is petitioning school officials to remove a branch of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement from participating in an internship and job fair next month. 

The petition to “Keep ICE Out of Towson” has garnered over 2,300 signatures as of Sunday afternoon. The group is calling for the university to remove Homeland Security Investigations, ICE’s largest investigative unit, from the university’s Mega Job and Internship Fair scheduled for March 7. The Career Center hosts the event annually.

ICE’s attendance at the job fair inflamed tensions on campus because of the Trump administration’s recent decision to throw out a longstanding federal policy that prevented immigration officers from arresting undocumented immigrants at sensitive locations like K-12 schools and colleges. Towson officials instructed Honors College faculty in January to contact the university’s legal counsel immediately should immigration officers enter their classrooms.

On Thursday, the Latin American Student Association, or LASO, posted its petition to Instagram and emailed it to over 200 student organizations. LASO said it opposes ICE’s presence because it has militarized border communities, criminalized immigration and has begun mass incarcerations as it deports immigrants.

“Towson University prides itself on fostering a diverse, inclusive, and welcoming environment for all students yet inviting ICE contradicts these values,” the Instagram post said. “Undocumented students, mixed-status families, and marginalized communities deserve to pursue higher education without fear.”

LASO President Luis Serna said he emailed the petition to the Career Center and the Office of the President, adding that he would follow-up with them for every 500 signatures the petition received.

“I just hope they listen,” Serna said. “I hope that they take their students’ safety in mind. They like to pride themselves on being a safe space, like a community, where students can come learn, and we can promote diversity and stuff. And so if that’s true, I just hope that they listen and they put students first.”

Immigration and Customs Enforcement attended the career fair last year.

The Career Center’s leaders met with several student employees Thursday to discuss ICE’s attendance at the fair, according to one of the employees, Jay Dutton. 

“The first reaction was confusion and a lack of like answers and clarity on the Career Center side,” Dutton said.

According to Dutton, officials told the students that legally, Towson couldn’t tell an employer not to come. They also said it would not punish employees who didn’t work the fair because of ICE’s attendance. 

A Towson spokesperson said in an email The U.S. Department of Homeland Security, which houses ICE, has attended career fairs for most of the program’s 24-year lifespan. All employers who participate in the fair support its goal to “provide for as many avenues for career advancement as possible for all students,” the spokesperson wrote.   

The Career Center can stop an employer from attending an event if it has “questions about the legitimacy of the job listing or the represented employer” or if the employer does not meet the National Association of Colleges and Employers’ Principles for Professional Conduct, according to the Career Center’s website.

Separately, Towson’s chapter of the Young Democratic Socialists of America made demands to Towson in a social media post Wednesday. It demanded that Towson remove ICE from the Career Fair and ban the agency from the campus permanently, that Towson send students clear guidelines and resources on dealing with ICE, and that Towson declare itself a sanctuary campus.

Sanctuary Campus generally refers to colleges that adopt policies to protect undocumented students from deportation.

“Our main focus right now is like, ‘Can we get them out?’” Davis Payton, chair of Towson’s Young Democratic Socialists of America, said in an interview. “And then after the seventh, regardless of what happens there are still issues here that need to be addressed.”