Trump’s D.C. Takeover Foretells How Federal Occupations Will Threaten Education
In August, President Donald Trump invoked Section 740 of the 1973 D.C. Home Rule Act to federalize the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) of Washington, D.C., deploying approximately 800 National Guard troops to locations across the city, including the National Mall, Union Station, and surrounding sites. While federal troops have been deployed in the nation’s capital before, this marked the first time that the city’s police force was placed under direct federal control specifically through the use of the Home Rule Act, a move that restructured local authority rather than merely bolstering security.
In January, the Trump Administration revoked longstanding federal protections that had barred immigration enforcement at “sensitive locations” such as schools, churches, and courthouses. Federal officials have stressed that schools themselves are not sites of deployment (yet), and under federal guidelines, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents cannot enter school areas that are not open to the public without explicit permission or a judicial warrant.
But for many families, their greatest fears are not of what could happen to them inside the classroom, but in the act of getting there. In Washington, D.C., uniformed soldiers and non-uniformed federal agents at bus stops and metro entrances have reshaped how safe the city feels, even for students who are U.S. citizens. That anxiety grew this spring when the U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay that allowed immigration officers to rely on racial profiling while detaining people in ongoing raids in Los Angeles, California, a decision that civil rights groups warn could intensify discriminatory enforcement.
District of Columbia Public Schools does not run a district-wide school bus system except for the service it provides for students with disabilities. Instead, the city issues public transit cards to all enrolled students via the Kids Ride Free program, providing up to 50,000 student cards each year, according to the District Department of Transportation. Consequently, students and their families are repeatedly placed in close proximity to federal security deployments during their commute to school.
Scott Goldstein, founder and executive director of EmpowerEd, a D.C.-based nonprofit organization focused on teacher retention and education equity, tells The Progressive that the presence of ICE agents at key transit nodes is already affecting student and teacher attendance. “In just the first couple days of school, we’ve seen the attendance of immigrant students decline,” he says. “That’s definitely a threat to their education as long as federal agents are here.”
William Thomas, a professorial lecturer at American University’s School of Education, says the shift from routine policing to a visible military presence in the city is redefining how neighborhoods are perceived. “The federalization of policing and the visible presence of the National Guard signals to students and families, particularly in Black and brown communities, that their neighborhoods are viewed as war zones, rather than learning communities,” he says. In turn, Thomas warns, “It risks normalizing military presence and undermines the [relationship of] trust that educational institutions should have with their communities.”
While the Department of Homeland Security has said that ICE agents do not raid schools, their visibility at metro stations and bus hubs effectively creates an atmosphere of criminality in the commute for immigrant students. The result, educators warn, is not only that schools see fewer students attending class, but that their essential foundation for learning is threatened when students stop viewing schools as a safe place.
Past examples of large-scale policing during periods of civil unrest highlight the impacts on student safety and learning. After the acquittals in 1992 of police officers charged with beating Rodney King, school attendance in the Los Angeles Unified School District plummeted in the midst of widespread unrest and the deployment of National Guard troops in the city. In some San Fernando Valley schools, attendance dropped by nearly 50 percent as students and families weighed the risks of traveling through neighborhoods where demonstrations and armed patrols were converging.
Research indicates that both militarized deployments and intensified local policing can disrupt students’ sense of safety and their willingness to attend school. In New York City, for example, a study published by the American Psychological Association found that exposure to aggressive policing—not involving the National Guard—predicted reduced test scores and increased absenteeism for Black boys.
In California, a study done by Brown University shows that spikes in immigration raids and other immigration enforcement activity often trigger sharp increases in student absences, sometimes lasting days or weeks after an incident. Goldstein says that D.C. schools are already showing early signs of this pattern, with immigrant student attendance declining in the first weeks of federal control in the city.
Police and military crackdowns on communities have long-term implications for community health and wellbeing. “Families who already navigate systemic inequities are now confronted with a heightened sense of vulnerability and fear,” Thomas says. “The displays of force echo this historical pattern of surveillance and state-sanctioned violence.”
Beyond the educational impact, the militarization of D.C. also carries a steep financial price. A Reuters review of National Guard deployment figures estimated that the mobilization in the city cost roughly $14.5 million in the first week of June, amounting to $2.6 million per day at peak military presence.
The psychological costs, although harder to measure, are also mounting. Thomas cautions that the visible presence of federal troops and ICE agents could potentially strain relationships between schools and families, with some parents beginning to see schools as places of surveillance rather than support.
The federal intervention has also renewed attention to D.C.’s unresolved quest for statehood. In recent weeks, members of Congress received a letter from DC Vote urging action on the issue, underscoring how federal control over the city continues to spark national debate. “The only path to us truly being able to determine our own destiny and policies is statehood,” Goldstein says. Without full autonomy, the city remains subject to federal decisions that can directly reshape the daily lives of students and families.
Federal officials have not yet stationed agents on D.C. school campuses, and ICE agents remain restricted from entering classrooms without a judicial warrant. But students’ sense of safety is being shaped in the spaces between home and school. Metro platforms, bus shelters, and checkpoints, now hosting a visible federal presence, are the same routes thousands of D.C. students take each day.
Public transit has long been part of the school day in a city where every student is issued a free metro card. With the deployment of federal troops, those commutes have become the front line of a broader struggle over education, safety, and local democracy.
Brianna Nargiso Newton is a Metro-Atlanta based educator, journalist, and lover of all things education, politics, social justice, and media. She is also a graduate of the Howard University School of Communications.
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