On July 21, Wilmer Chavarria was returning home from a visit to see family in Nicaragua when he was detained by border authorities at the Houston airport.
Chavarria, the superintendent of Vermont’s Winooski school district, became the latest U.S. citizen to experience a border detention in recent months. But the detention also turned into a struggle to protect confidential student and staff information.
During the time he was held, agents demanded access to his electronic devices. He allowed them to search his personal devices, but refused to let them sign into his district-issued phone and laptop because doing so would allow them access to student and staff information protected under federal law.
Refusing them access wasn’t only a legal matter, said Chavarria. Maintaining the privacy of those records was also a matter of trust.
“They said they would ‘stain’ my record if I didn’t comply, and, to be honest, that’s one of the things that is still scary to me because they have access to my files and records, and I don’t know what can happen,” Chavarria told Education Week. “But I’d rather lose my job in this way than lose my job because I violated federal law and violated the trust of my community.”
Chavarria, a U.S. citizen since 2018, had been enrolled in Global Entry—a U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency program that allows expedited clearance at airports for preapproved, low-risk travelers—for years, he said, and had not previously had any problems entering or exiting the United States.
But this time, officers—nearly all wearing street clothes, Chavarria said—separated him from his husband for nearly five hours, confiscated his personal devices as well as his district-issued phone and laptop, and requested access to each device.
The situation escalated as he repeatedly refused to provide the officers with the passwords to his district laptop and phone.
Over the course of five hours, Chavarria said he was questioned by up to four officers at a time and was denied access to his phone and his husband. He was allowed no outside communication before officers eventually released him.
The incident has received national attention in the week since it happened, thrusting Chavarria into the spotlight amid a national debate about federal immigration policies and enforcement.
Chavarria is no stranger to high-profile controversy, though.
His district of nearly 800 students in Vermont’s most diverse city made headlines in February when it became the first in the state to pass a “sanctuary school” policy that aims to protect students and families from immigration enforcement at schools.
Then, in April, Chavarria spoke out against the state education department’s request that districts sign a U.S. Department of Education certification that they weren’t using “illegal DEI practices”—a part of the Trump administration’s efforts to stamp out DEI at schools and colleges. The state education department backed off that request within days.
Chavarria spoke with Education Week about his experience being detained and its ripple effects on himself and the school district he leads. This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.
A U.S. Customers and Border Protection spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment about Chavarria’s detention.
What happened when you did not grant the authorities access to your district devices?
They didn’t believe me when I said, “I do not consent for you to go through my district files because they have federally protected student and family information.”
It doesn’t matter who you are. It doesn’t matter if you are a federal officer. The law applies equally. You need a judicial warrant for that.
They became extremely angry at that. They said that if I didn’t give them access to those files, that it was highly suspicious, that I’m probably hiding something.
But I just kept telling them, it’s not that I’m hiding anything, it’s that I have a district policy that doesn’t allow me to release those files to just anybody who asks. It doesn’t make any exceptions for federal officers.
And second, it’s the law. You can look it up.
They said they would “stain” my record if I didn’t comply, and, to be honest, that’s one of the things that is still scary to me because they have access to my files and records and I don’t know what can happen.
But I’d rather lose my job in this way than lose my job because I violated federal law and violated the trust of my community.
Did you try anything else to get the officers to understand your position?
I just kept saying I will comply when you allow me to do what the law requires, which is to allow me to get consent from the district’s lawyer. I wasn’t even asking for a personal lawyer. I was just asking to make a call to the district lawyer, but they denied that, too. I couldn’t touch my phone and I couldn’t communicate with anyone.
It sounds like you went to great personal risk to protect students’ private information. Did you at any point consider backing down and consenting to their search?
Of course, because psychologically, after hours without even being able to look at a clock to know what time it is, and multiple people being sent to you and using different tactics and threatening you with different actions and loss of employment, you can start to question what’s true and what’s not.
They at one point even came to me with pamphlets with information that they said proved I was wrong, but I know the educational laws and my responsibilities. I just kept saying, “Yes, you can go through my personal stuff. No, you cannot go through school district files.”
How did the situation resolve?
At some point, they gained access to my devices and searched them out of my sight. I don’t know what they went through, what they saw, what they didn’t see.
They said they didn’t go through the district files, but I have no way to know that.
Until the end, I said out loud every chance I got that I did not consent for them to look through district files and, if they did, the information was obtained unlawfully.
It’s just unsettling to not know.
How has the detainment affected you, personally?
It is very stressful on me, and it’s a really tough place to be, to be so public and to be hated by a good number of people out there in the United States, when all I’m trying to do is say, “Stop attacking our brown and Black kids.”
I worry about myself and my family and my community all the time.
How has this changed the guidance you provide when immigrant families in your district ask for advice or reassurance?
I used to try and reassure them that they should not be so scared and that they should be able to go about their day without fear, that if they have a U.S. passport they have rights and should not be afraid to travel. Now I’m not able to do that.
It’s not safe for some of our communities, especially, to travel, and we should not pretend otherwise. I don’t think we should be frozen or dramatize the situation, and we should all continue to live our lives and do the work we need to do, but we should also not be delusional and pretend everything’s normal, because it’s not.
You’ve said you feel scared, both personally and professionally. How will that affect the equity work you do in your district moving forward?
What we’ve been trying to do since we adopted the sanctuary school policy is to say, “The world may be burning, but this is a sanctuary, no matter what. You may lose your rights everywhere else, but will not lose your rights in our schools.”
The only thing that changes is that I have even a stronger conviction that this is the right work, that this is the right thing, and that we should not just be assuming that just because we talk about equity and support for all that we’re off the hook. We have to actually do it.
I’ve remained true to what I think my job as a superintendent is, which is to look out for the safety and well-being and belonging of every single one of our students. I don’t know that there’s any different way to do my job properly.
Are you worried that continuously speaking out and standing up for immigrant students might subject your district to retaliation?
The board had 100% willingness to adopt a sanctuary schools policy from the get-go, but they had very in-depth concerns about the implications and what kind of attention it could attract from the bad players.
We began to work based on the policy, knowing that we were going to pay a price. Now, moving forward, knowing that there’s a chance the district—or even myself—could see some consequences of that, I’m not going to lie, every time something like this happens, I am scared.
So, I am afraid for the future, and I may not have yet seen the extent of the price that there is to pay.
And is that a scary thing to say? Of course it is, and I am afraid. But the fact that I’m afraid doesn’t mean that I’m going to stop doing what I’m doing—I’m going to have to do it through the fear.
