Editor,

San Mateo students, with the full acquiescence of teachers, principals and school boards, staged a massive walkout last week to protest against enforcing immigration laws.

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(16) comments

MichKosk

Great point Scott. While some kids are "true believers", most just wanted to feel important and have an afternoon off. And even the true believers can't answer basic questions about immigration policy: What (Democrat passed) immigration laws do you think we should enforce? If ICE is abolished, what replaces it? Should we have open borders? Why is the US different from every other country that enforces its borders? Should anyone who gets into the country be allowed to take advantage of our welfare programs such as SNAP and Medicaid? (And if so how is this financially sustainable for the US?) Why was it OK for Obama to deport millions of illegal immigrants but not OK for Trump to deport far fewer? Should even those who come here illegally and commit other crimes be allowed to stay? Why was Tom Homan a hero under Obama and a "Nazi" now? If "No one is illegal on stolen land" (A sign seen at the protests), what have you done to give land back to the Ohlone people (or whoever they "stole" it from?)

Sadly there was no nuanced, thoughtful discussion in the schools regarding these issues. Just memes, slogans, chanting and yelling. But I'm sure the kids felt great saving the world!

Terence Y

Thanks for your letter, Mr. Abramson. There’s a reason California rates in the bottom 10 states in terms of K-12 academic performance even though they’re among the top 20 states in school funding. Silly antics taking away from education time. Let’s hope there’s plenty of video and photos in social media so we can tie students to these protests. And let’s hope prospective college admissions officers or employers view, or use AI, to screen social media posts to determine whether these students are worthy of placement in their college or place of business. A massive walkout of offers to these students, if you will.

Dirk van Ulden

Scott - the woke crowd is still in power here and the school administrators should be called on the carpet. My granddaughter is a freshman at a public HS in the East Bay and came home with a note from the principal that only students who are authorized by their parents to walk out can do so. None of the faculty and administration is authorized to participate. If they do, they are subject to discipline and the students would be marked as truant. So, there is still hope in the Bay Area, it all depends on where one lives. Actually, one of her classmates held a sign stating "stolen land". She is a pathetic resident of a country club. It confirms what you say, these kids are clueless, as are some of their parents and many of their teachers.

Ariolimax

I'll offer a positive note. My daughter participated in the walk-out, and it ended up creating an opportunity for a much deeper conversation between us about immigration. I wanted her to know more about both sides of the issue before she making a decision to protest a policy or position.

What's surprising, and discouraging, to me was how little she knew about some basic concepts, like the fact that there are established pathways for legal immigration or how other countries have more strict enforcement. She’s a straight-A high school student, and her grandmother immigrated from Latin America, so that gap in foundational knowledge really struck me. It also made me wonder what many other students might be missing and how this is a direct result of schools giving up on civics long ago.

By the end of our talk, she said she still wanted to attend the walk-out, but for a more specific reason. She disagreed with certain ICE tactics. She didn’t frame it as support for open borders or that immigration enforcement is inherently racist. From my perspective, that was a win. She clarified her own thinking instead of adopting a position based on peer pressure or teacher-led bias.

MichKosk

That is great to hear and kudos to you on your parenting. My son did not walk out but really wanted to understand the issues and challenge some of those that did walk out on their beliefs. He did research about some of the claims the protesters made, he, like your daughter learned about the history of immigration laws in our country and how other countries, and other US administrations handled the issues. He wanted to make sure he knew the facts before engaging in debate with some of his friends. I have always told my kids I do not want them just thinking exactly like me (and believe me they don't) but to look at all sides of an issue and come to their own beliefs. Unfortunately not all parents are like this.. one friend of my son's said his parents were "making him" do the walk out. Yet he had no answers to the questions my son asked him about immigration and policy.

DavidKristofferson

MitchKosk, Ariolimax, and others raise many valid points about our students not getting a well-rounded view of the issues at school … a subject that I also mentioned in regards to this forum recently too.

But I think the MAGA side should take a VERY close look at the comments of Terrence Y here. The continual expressions by several elements of MAGA about hunting down and punishing, even executing, people, including comments made most prominently “our Great President Trump” frankly is SICK, UNAMERICAN, and DESERVES to be condemned. TY’s speech is protected by the First Amendment, but is yet another example that should cause MAGA people to WAKE UP!

Terence Y

Hilarious. Your outrage, DavieKristofferrson, is noted and immediately dismissed because the sick, un-American and deserving to be condemned you speak of are the rabid Democrats who put the welfare of criminals and terrorists over the American people. I’ve asked numerous times for you to explain these hateful and unpatriotic Democrats and yet you can’t. No Democrat can. Instead they waste our time with virtue signaling, feeble personal attacks, and unburdening their emotions.

Instead of continually obsessing over me, I’m positive our dear readers would prefer you rebut the superior arguments highlighting the hypocrisy and narrow focus/cherry-picking of your assertions. To borrow from Kamala, “We've got to take this stuff seriously, as seriously as you are because you have been forced to take this seriously.” So take this stuff seriously and skip the nonsense obsession. More people, MAGA and not, are WAKING UP and they’re doing their patriotic duty to help ICE do the job we voted for. Thank you for your attention to this matter and have a Trump-tastic day!

DavidKristofferson

Read your own comments below, Terence, from the standpoint of someone who is not obsessed with Trump **if you are capable of doing that**. You advocate finding photos and videos of local high school students, who the other people here acknowledge are misinformed children, and you hope that this will be used to torpedo their college admissions. This is the way the Soviet Union and Communist China operate, and you and your “great” president and his numerous minions are advocating and bringing this type of surveillance and punishment to the USA?!?

You have asked me to respond to your climate change, ridiculous “steam age,” and other points many times, and yet you still do not understand why I am not going to do so. It is NOT because you are “winning” (maybe in your own mind). I simply am not going to take the time to rewrite scientific material for someone who has demonstrated repeatedly that their mind is obsessive and closed. This information is readily available for anyone to read if they *want* to do so. Nor am I going to defend extremist left-wing positions that I do not hold just because you asked me to do so.

What I do find offensive is that you have become a self-appointed attack dog to badger anyone who posts an opinion contrary to yours in the newspaper’s comments section, and every now and then, like in this particularly egregious instance, you need to get a taste of your own medicine. It doesn’t taste very pleasant, does it…

I am *certain* you will have a Trump-tastic day! What other kind is there in the MAGA universe?

Terence Y

Here we go again with Mr. Kristofferson writing almost 300 words to play the victim and offer excuses. Hey DavidKristofferson (if that’s who you really are) I know why you’re not able to respond to me but my goal is to show our dear readers you’re unable to explain why you give get-out-of-jail-free cards to climate activists who burn carbon to their hearts’ desires while lecturing us on reducing carbon emissions. As well as giving get-out-of-jail-free cards to Democrats who put the welfare of criminals and terrorists over the American people.

I find the hypocrisy offensive as well as how you’ve become a self-appointed attack dog to badger anyone who posts an opinion contrary to yours, or who has the audacity to call out the hypocrisy in you unsupported stances. You say you’re giving me a taste of medicine. Whatever that medicine is, it is more than pleasant and tastes like winning. And I’m still not tired of it. Thanks to our (yes, our) great President Trump.

Again, instead of continually obsessing over me (I’m flattered) and launching feeble attacks or playing the victim and offering excuses on why you can’t support your assertions, please make an effort to post meaningful contributions to a thread. But not on climate change since it’s been established nobody cares enough to do anything about it, other than talk. To borrow from Kamala, “I think that, to be very honest with you, I do believe that we should have rightly believed, but we certainly believe that certain issues are just settled. Certain issues are just settled.” Have a Trump-tastic day! BTW, there are MAGA-tastic days, Vance-tastic days, Rubio-tastic days, Bessent-tastic days, Noem-tastic days… There’s not much need to offer those wishes since most LTE’s are TDS-related and don’t cite the great work done by other MAGA luminaries.

DavidKristofferson

Another cut-and-paste response, T-bot 🤣? Great! It makes my response easy. Apparently the “bot” could not read the following:

“Read your own comments below, Terence, from the standpoint of someone who is not obsessed with Trump **if you are capable of doing that**. You advocate finding photos and videos of local high school students, who the other people here acknowledge are misinformed children, and you hope that this will be used to torpedo their college admissions. This is the way the Soviet Union and Communist China operate, and you and your “great” president and his numerous minions are advocating and bringing this type of surveillance and punishment to the USA?!?”

The more Americans see this kind of behavior here and, much more importantly, in the Trump administration, the more they will be motivated to kick such people out of power. Minnesota has been a great example of this attitude of excessive cruelty. Keep on acting like this, T-bot, and thinking that you are “winning” 🤣! You are helping the Democrats immensely!

Terence Y

DK – TBot here. Hey DavidKristofferson, we’ve gone over this before…if you stop the sheer number of TDS-afflicted LTE’s obsessing over Trump, you’d likely see a corresponding reduction in my response. As for students or anyone posting to social media, they should be aware that background checks of social media may be used to screen applicants for colleges or jobs. Folks who are lucky to have retired may not care because they’ve already paid their dues, so to speak, but folks moving up to begin paying their dues haven’t. Imagine you’re a college who has lost federal funding due to non-desirable students. Are you willing to risk hundreds of millions of dollars to offer admission to folks who don’t respect law and order? Imagine you’re hiring for law enforcement and you see an applicant has participated in anti-ICE protests. Would you hire someone knowing they don’t respect law and order? Now expand that to the defense industry or employers working on top secret projects. Would you want to employ someone who doesn’t respect law and order?

As for how the Soviet Union and Communist China operate, you and Democrats showed us the way in continually pushing for COVID jabs that don’t work and for attempting to penalize law-abiding gun owners while giving get-out-of-jail-free passes to criminals. Similar to the get-out-of-jail-free passes you’re giving to Trump-obsessed folks while accusing me of being Trump-obsessed. Seems to be your modus operandi: demonize those you don’t agree with while giving free passes to folks who you agree with. And now, all of a sudden, you're offended? I find the hypocrisy offensive but not unexpected from folks who can’t support their positions.

The more Americans see this kind of anti-American behavior from folks who have been easily manipulated by Democrats and, much more importantly, Democrats putting the welfare of criminals and terrorists over the American people, the more patriots will be motivated to kick those Democrats out of power. Minnesota has been a great example of this anti-American behavior. Keep on acting like this and thinking that you are “winning.” You are helping Trump and the ongoing and increasing MAGA movement immensely! Have a Trump-tastic day! TBot out!

Mick

Gosh, Scott, before you know it, the everywhere evils will be shooting unarmed women in the face.

ClashFan

I find the comments of Mr. Abramson unfair in equating immigrants with doing something illegal. No one is above the law. And of course no one deserves to be murdered, and the perpetrators should be tried and punished accordingly. And I share Mr. Kristofferson’s point about the increasingly violent rhetoric we’re seeing close to home. Former Border Patrol agent Jennifer Budd gives her insight and has a link to a recent ICE promotional video that uses a Bible verse to justify laying waste to an undesirable people https://jennbudd.substack.com/p/border-patrol-ice-and-christian-nationalism.

The protests in Iran consisted of terrorist acts orchestrated by the CIA, State Department and Mossad with the goal of regime change. Iran jammed the Starlink signals the agents were using and put an end to it. This also let them know who the agents were: https://www.moonofalabama.org/2026/01/iran-the-ragtag-network-of-activists-run-by-the-state-department.html.

Terence Y

Unfortunately, ClashFan, you’re incorrectly attributing comments by Mr. Abramson. Mr. Abramson highlighted illegal immigrants and nobody, unless they do so on purpose to push misinformation and to gaslight readers, conflates legal with legal immigrants. As such, Mr. Abramson is rightly equating illegal immigrants with criminal behavior because they are criminals. As for violent rhetoric, we’ve seen that coming from Democrats in addition to actual violence caused by folks listening to and paid by divisive Democrats. No amount of gaslighting will change those facts.

ClashFan

Thank you Mr. Y. I was put off by Mr. Abramson’s wording, which I interpreted as illegal immigration is the cause of the brutal murders of innocent victims. Murder is deplorable no matter who did it. Being undocumented is a misdemeanor, so it is illegal. So you are saying everyone who commits a misdemeanor is a criminal, which is a true statement in the strictest sense.

Terence Y

Thanks for your response, ClashFan, but I’m not the one saying everyone who commits a misdemeanor is a criminal. Our system of law and order is saying everyone who commits a misdemeanor is a criminal. A true statement in any sense. BTW, crossing the border illegally is a misdemeanor the first time. If you’re deported and caught crossing the border again, it is a felony. Another reason folks who are in the U.S. illegally should self-deport. Not only for a monetary bonus, but they’ll have a chance of returning, legally, in the future. Those who are deported won’t have that opportunity.

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