Dive Brief:
- Texas Gov. Greg Abbott took to Twitter recently to decry the "campus sanctuary" movement and to threaten budget cuts to any school that refuses to disclose immigration status information on attending students.
- His tweet was in response to a student petition at Texas State College, which called for universities to block information release and to denounce hate speech and hostility on campus.
- Texas State officials have announced that they will not provide sanctuary status due to legal concerns.
Dive Insight:
It will be difficult for campuses to offer protection for illegal students if they are based in states with insistent legislature against the efforts. With presidential and congressional support against the effort, campus leaders will not find support at any meaningful government level to oppose the movement, or to block resulting funding ramifications.
The alternative is to devote specific campus resources to enhancing promotion of a more tolerant and welcoming society, in an effort to show the financial and social benefit of supporting immigration reform in key states like Texas, Florida and New Mexico. Research and student activism can create the kind of public movements that force the school to the forefront of the issue while not being vulnerable to political retaliation.