By NANCY WEST. InDepthNH.org
Implying there are more illegal immigrant students than the three the University of New Hampshire System told him Wednesday, Deputy House Majority Leader Joe Sweeney threatened possible U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement involvement.
“If USNH won’t take this seriously, then it’s time to consider 287(g) agreements between campus police and ICE to restore accountability,” Sweeney said in a news release Wednesday.
Those are agreements that allow police departments the authority to perform certain federal immigration enforcement functions after they are trained and certified by ICE.
Encouraged by Republican Gov. Kelly Ayotte, there are 10 law enforcement departments, including State Police, in New Hampshire that have signed such agreements with ICE.
Tania DeLuzuriaga, UNH’s Executive Director of Media Relations, said university police derive their authority from the Durham police department so they would need their permission to sign an agreement with ICE, but it is not out of the realm of possibilities.
As a public university ICE can come on campus anytime, she said.
The semester is over so most students have left the campus. Privacy laws require the names of the illegal immigrant students remain confidential, DeLuzuriaga said.
Asked if the university was concerned about the safety of those three students, DeLuzuriaga said: “We were not concerned about their safety until a state Representative launched a narrative that three out of more than 21,000 students were taking resources from New Hampshire residents which is patently untrue.”
Sweeney and House Majority Leader Jason Osborne have both been critical of the university system claiming there are many illegal immigrants studying there, and also alleging they cause New Hampshire residents to be denied admission.
At the same time legislators working on a state budget are considering cutting the university system’s budget by 30 percent.
House Minority Leader Rep. Alexis Simpson said Sweeney was not telling the truth about illegal immigrant students.
“The data has been made clear and there is no issue with admissions in our university system. It is shameful that Rep. Sweeney has spent hours spewing lies about our New Hampshire college students, time which could have been better spent working to make college and life more affordable for young people in New Hampshire,” Simpson said.
The headline on the news release from House Republicans quoting Sweeney said “First Three Illegal Alien Students Acknowledged by USNH,” implying there are more.
“Deputy Majority Leader Joe Sweeney is calling out the University System of New Hampshire (USNH) for confirming that illegal aliens are currently admitted and enrolled at taxpayer-funded colleges—while thousands of legal New Hampshire residents have been denied admission,” the release said.
“The priorities of USNH are completely backwards,” said Sweeney. “While over 2,400 Granite Staters were rejected from our public universities in recent years, USNH is publicly encouraging illegal aliens to apply and rewarding them with in-state tuition. That is a slap in the face to every hardworking family paying taxes to support these institutions.”
“According to USNH, three currently enrolled students are either undocumented or under temporary immigration protections. Even more concerning, USNH admits it likely has more than three, but cannot say for certain—because it doesn’t consistently track immigration status, leaving the public in the dark,” the release said.
USNH also released data Wednesday regarding the number of New Hampshire students denied
enrollment over the last four years.
“All USNH institutions have capacity to take additional students and USNH accepts all qualified New Hampshire students. More than one third (35%) of New Hampshire resident students who applied to a USNH institution applied to more than one (University of New Hampshire, Keene State College or Plymouth State University).
“So, while a student may have been denied admission at one USNH school, they may have been admitted to another. In fact, USNH accepted 95.2 % of New Hampshire resident students to at least one institution over the past four fall terms. The number of students denied admission to any institution over the past four fall terms was 1,083 individuals (4.8%) out of 22,557 applicants.”
USNH Chancellor Catherine Provencher said: “Students are denied admission if they are not academically prepared. The last thing we want to do is have students paying tuition and possibly taking on debt if we do not think they will succeed academically. We do not admit any students from outside of New Hampshire at the expense of our Granite State students.”