Trump admin official says 1 in 7 CMS students are ‘here illegally.’ Here are the facts
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Stephen Miller claimed one in seven CMS students is undocumented; no data supports.
- CMS absences rose amid Border Patrol activity, but absences do not prove status.
- Officials note schools cannot track immigration status.
Stephen Miller, the White House deputy chief of staff, claimed in a viral X post on Monday that one in seven students in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools is in the country illegally.
That number is an oversimplification that educators are calling incorrect.
“It’s a pretty harmful narrative to be circulating for a few reasons,” said Sara Howell, the associate director for policy and research at Public School Forum of North Carolina, a nonpartisan education think tank. “There’s no data to support what he’s saying.”
CMS records show more than 27,000 students — or 21% of the student population — were absent Monday for the first day of school since Border Patrol agents began Operation Charlotte’s Web. The Department of Homeland Security reported more than 250 arrests so far, and federal agents heavily targeted Latinos.
Other local outlets used unofficial data Monday evening to report nearly 21,000 students didn’t show up for class. That meant approximately 15% of students were absent on Monday, WSOC reporter Joe Bruno said in the post on X, formerly Twitter, that attracted Miller’s attention.
“So a conservative estimate is that one-seventh of a major southern public school district is here illegally,” Miller responded. He’s been a leading voice and architect behind the Trump administration’s hardline approach to immigration, including deportation policies.
Miller’s estimate assumed every absent student lacked legal status.
About 9,600 students were absent last Monday. That was before Border Patrol arrived in Charlotte.
“It’s simply not true that 15% of these students are undocumented immigrants,” Howell said. “There are 15% of students, at least, that feel unsafe in their schools.”
Public schools cannot track immigration status
The U.S. Supreme Court set a precedent in 1982 that all students, regardless of documentation status, can access a public education. Public schools are not allowed to ask for immigration status or deny enrollment based on whether a student is undocumented, Howell said.
It is impossible to know with certainty how many undocumented students are enrolled in CMS schools, Howell said.
Schools track English learner status, which identifies students who speak languages other than English at home. The district reported 32,891 English learners last school year, according to a 2024 report by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. That represents about 23% of the total CMS student population.
But that number alone lacks nuance and should not speak to documentation status, Howell said. She was previously an English as a second language teacher.
Many students are designated English learners even though they speak English natively, she said. U.S.-born students can be designated English learners, too.
“It means that they’re a multilingual learner who brings a lot to the school, and they are receiving some kind of support because of that,” Howell said. “That’s all it means.”
Parents are keeping kids at home out of fear
Encounters in Charlotte include when federal agents on Saturday busted Honduran-born Willy Aceituno’s car window and dragged him to the pavement in an encounter that has since gained national attention. Aceituno has been a U.S. citizen for 6 years.
Incidents like those worry Hispanic families of all statuses, Howell said.
“What they are seeing is an environment where folks are being detained and picked up by ICE or CPB simply because they have brown skin,” Howell said. “They are not always taking the time to look at papers. They aren’t checking documentation status. It’s kinda detain first, ask questions later.”
Erin DeMund said she saw that fear play out at Oaklawn Language Academy, a language immersion school where she’s worked as a reading interventionist for nine years. Between 20% and 30% of students at her school have been absent every day this week, she said.
Eleven of 20-something students were missing from one fifth-grade class on Monday. The students who remained shared concerns about their families and what they’ve seen happen in their neighborhoods, DeMund said.
“I know there were many students in my school who were born here who were not at school this week. And I know that those families have communicated fear about racial profiling,” DeMund said, adding that neither she nor her school tracks student immigration status. “The fear is about racial profiling. The fear is not about immigration status.”
This story was originally published November 20, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
