A Facebook post on a local discussion board Tuesday morning warned that Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers were spotted near Elk Horn Elementary School in West Sacramento. The post noted the color of the vehicles and that they had no markings.
Similar social media posts have spread in recent weeks warning of ICE raids, checkpoints or sightings. However, most have been proven false or were instead regular local law enforcement activity.
Giorgos Kazanis, executive director of communications for Washington Unified School District in West Sacramento, noted that misinformation has been spreading in the community regarding the presence of ICE agents in schools.
“We have official confirmation from local law enforcement that they haven’t been around there,” he said referring to West Sacramento schools. The district released a statement to families Tuesday reassuring the community that there has been no evidence of ICE being present at any school in the district.
Kazanis added that the school district has been in “constant communication” with the police department and that none of the schools received reports that ICE agents would be coming. He recommended that any parents concerned about the recent changes to federal civil immigration law visit the district’s immigration support website.
“Our schools are safe havens regardless of any policy changes at the federal or local level,” Kazanis added. “We do everything in our power to protect our students and our families and make sure that their instructional days are uninterrupted. Today was another example of that where the safest place for our kids to be is in our campuses.”
Taylor Nelson, Division Manager for the West Sacramento Police Department’s Community and Support Division, said he could not confirm if this was an ICE operation noting that the department was not contacted by the federal law enforcement agency.
“There is not a requirement for them to notify local jurisdictions of their activity,” he added in an email. “I can confirm that this was not a WSPD operation.”
Allison Smith, Public Information Officer for the Sacramento Police Department, said she hasn’t received any information that similar operations are occurring in Sacramento.
“Our hope would be that if that activity was to happen, we would receive that information well ahead of time,” she said. “At this point, we haven’t gotten any information regarding that.”
Smith explained that Senate Bill 54, California’s sanctuary law, prohibits local law enforcement from enforcing federal civil immigration laws.
“So basically anything that ICE would handle,” she said. “From a law enforcement perspective, I can understand people’s concerns. But we’ve made information available online and through social media about how we are handling this whole situation surrounding federal immigration laws.”
Autumn Gonzalez is a volunteer attorney with NorCal Resist, a mutual aid organization that provides support to asylum seekers, refugees and other immigrant community members. She said her organization has not seen an increase in enforcement activity from the federal agency compared to its activity during the Biden Administration.
“They’re in our community, they’re regularly going out and doing enforcement activity, but for the most part, what we’ve seen them doing is their regular activity that they’ve been doing for the last four years,” she said. “I think this is a strategic decision by the Trump Administration to make as much noise as possible about what’s routine activity in order to frighten people, to make them consider leaving the country or going underground. I don’t think it’s on accident.”
NorCal Resist runs a rapid response hotline for the region that Gonzalez said has already received hundreds of calls this year. She explained that “the vast majority” of them tend to be regular law enforcement like a traffic stop.
“People are very hypervigilant right now, they’re scared,” she said. “Whenever they see something unusual, they’re concerned that it might be ICE.”
Gonzalez encouraged people to be aware of their surroundings and to call her organization’s hotline — 916-282-0256 — to report potential ICE activity.
“If they can provide us information so we can go check it out, we’re happy to go check it out for folks and let them know what we saw,” she added.
ICE did not return a request for comment.
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