The ASUU Senate unanimously passed JR-10 during its final meeting of the academic year, calling on the University of Utah to adopt sanctuary campus policies and expand protections for students regardless of immigration status.
This resolution urges university leadership to limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, strengthen privacy protections and formally designate the university as a sanctuary campus.
Public forum shows student support
During the public forum, student organizers spoke in favor of the resolution, pointing to months of advocacy efforts.
“We have collected a petition that now has … over 4,000 combined signatures,” Samantha Reagan, a member of Mecha de U of U, said. “There’s a ton of student support for this, and we think that the sanctuary campus resolution pathway is of utmost importance.”
Speakers emphasized fear and uncertainty surrounding immigration enforcement, particularly on college campuses.
“We know how much of a sense of fear ICE has created, especially on campus,” Reagan said. “There’s so much that’s still not clear about what UUPD would actually do, or if an emergency notification system would actually be used.”
Advocates urged senators to support both JR-10 and related legislation, framing the issue as central to student safety. “We’re here to say yes on JR-10, we think that this going through would be the most reflective of what students have really been speaking up for,” Reagan said.
Resolution outlines policy changes
JR-10 includes a series of recommendations directed at university leadership and administrative offices. These include expanding non-discrimination policies to explicitly include immigration status, limiting the collection of non-essential data and restricting when campus officials can share information with federal agencies like the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The resolution also calls for mandatory “Know Your Rights” training and limits on immigration enforcement access to non-public campus spaces without judicial warrants.
Presenters argued these changes are legally supported and necessary to protect students. “As of April 2, 2026, no current federal legislation prohibits institutions of higher education from establishing themselves as sanctuary campuses,” the bill states.
Senators debate safety and responsibility
During questioning, ASUU senators raised concerns about potential unintended consequences, including whether a sanctuary designation could attract federal scrutiny.
“I’ve heard from some community folks and other students that they feel like it involves a good resolution that it puts a target on us by saying this,” Jack O’Leary, senate chair for the College of Architecture and Planning, said. “What would you say to those students or folks who say that it makes us more of a target for the federal government”?
In response, Londyn Reynolds, the sponsor of the resolution, argued that the concern reinforces the need for action. “What I’m hearing is that we don’t trust the federal government to abide by the Constitution,” they said. “To me, that’s an excellent argument for formally committing to constitutional protections.”
Other questions focused on data privacy and university operations. Reynolds clarified the resolution targets only “non-essential data,” acknowledging that some information must still be collected for processes like international student visas.
Personal testimony shapes debate
As the debate opened, multiple senators shared personal connections to immigration issues. Shaiban Khan, a senator at the College of Social and Behavioral Science, talked about his personal experience.
“I will go out of my way and say that I, myself, have been affected,” Khan said. “My existence itself is political.”
Senator Ana Sanchez Benet described the weight of the decision. “This makes me really emotional because I myself am an immigrant,” Sanchez Benet said. “I really do support this.”
Juniper Nilsson, co-sponsor of the resolution, framed the resolution as a matter of student safety rather than politics.
“Students deserve to feel safe. Full stop,” Nilsson said. “They deserve to feel safe in their classrooms, in their dorms, traveling to campus, from campus, on campus.”
Eli Asay from the School of Dentistry highlighted impacts beyond students. “I would hate for any one of [my patients] to feel fearful to come and see me as their dental provider,” Asay said, noting many patients are in varying stages of the immigration process.
Others connected the issue to broader campus climate concerns, including academic freedom and student retention.
Unanimous vote closes final meeting
Following the debate, senators moved to a roll call vote. Every college representative voted in favor of the resolution, and the final tally was unanimous.
“This bill passes unanimously with the consent of the Senate,” Nilsson announced. The vote marked the final action of the Senate’s last meeting of the year.
Looking ahead
While JR-10 is a non-binding resolution, it formally communicates student government priorities to university leadership. The measure calls on multiple offices, including the President’s Office, the Office of General Counsel and Campus Security, to implement its recommendations.
Supporters say the resolution sends a clear message about student needs. “This is a step towards much stronger protections for everyone, regardless of immigration status, regardless of documentation,” Nilsson said.
John Hedberg | Apr 20, 2026 at 11:54 am
FYI, I’m not sure the American Institutions course we’re all required to pass for graduation is being taught very thoroughly. Here’s why:
From 2021-2023, Democrats held both houses of Congress plus the White House, and they neither passed their promised Immigration Reform nor upgraded the longstanding immigration law already in existence. Therefore, current immigration law is bipartisan, since those in power took no action to change it when they had full power: they affirmed it by leaving it as it is.
Under Article II of the Constitution, the Chief Executive is required to enforce federal law passed by Congress, even the parts he or she may not like very much. That’s what it means to live in a democracy. The majority votes on policy, and until the vote of that everchanging majority shifts the law again (weeks or decades), we all agree by a “civil compact” to obey & support the law until such a time as we can convince Congress to change it or elect new leaders to do the same.
President Trump was elected by a majority, winning all 7 swing states (so he carried independents and even millions of Democrat votes), with the specific mandate to enforce immigration according to the law, including deportation of all immigrants who came unlawfully until such a time as they reapply & enter lawfully. CNN continues to run polls showing the American majority still favors doing this, so Constitutional democracy requires the Chief Executive to follow through on enforcing lawful immigration, including deportation, until the law changes (the law, not the President).
As someone who’s spent most of my life in disadvantaged parts of town among huge numbers of friends who are legal immigrants, I can tell you that these neighborhoods are the ones who feel the grievous burden of illegal immigration first & worst. These neighborhoods are where millions of illegal immigrants (nice people, most of them) ended up landing, driving up competition & prices for cheap housing, low-wage jobs, healthcare & insurance costs, and further crowding public school classrooms in already failing school districts in an era where teachers don’t have the resources to teach both English plus their subjects with any hope of achieving decent reading, writing, or math skills for any of their students.
Inflation is the direct result of millions of (nice) people arriving in the same already-struggling neighborhoods, and who is affected first & most by even small rises in prices?
Also, plenty of friends whose families arrived legally have other family waiting patiently in line, trying to enter the United States legally. When (nice) people enter unlawfully, these family members waiting in line outside the country, often in very trying circumstances, end up having to wait even longer, since mass unlawful immigration unerringly results in further restriction to legal immigration as a reaction to inflation & overcrowding. It also slows up the legal process, since most of the U.S. Immigration folks already have their time fully engaged processing the millions of unlawful nice people.
So, unlawful immigrants (nice as most of them are) create huge pressure & suffering on already vulnerable and overburdened communities & families, and family members of legal immigrants waiting in line to enter legally get even further delayed from rejoining their families, creating all kinds of added strain to those human beings (financial, personal, and some of these folks are in risky circumstances while they wait).
All this is to illustrate that our Constitutional democracy has established (by vote) reasonable limits on immigration in order to protect the most vulnerable first & foremost, including legal immigrants and disadvantaged communities who get bit worst as a result of too much migration too fast. The President is required to enforce Constitutional laws he or she was elected to carry out: that’s one of the primary functions of the Executive Branch, according to our American Institutions courses.
So, by declaring a “sanctuary” status regarding enforcement of bipartisan Constitutional laws already approved by American voters in order to keep every community, including & especially disadvantaged communities (full of the most vulnerable families) safe and affordable and functioning well, are we helping people more than we’re hurting them? Are we protecting democracy more than we’re obstructing it? Do we really care about the poor & disenfranchised among all our demographic groups, or are we just trying to say one person’s suffering is more important than another person’s suffering, when we’re all equally human, equally people?
Central to this: if we say one person’s feelings are more important than another person’s, isn’t that the same thing the Nazi’s and the Jim Crow Democrats did during the Progressive era of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries? They said the feelings of people they favored were more important (called bigotry, or racism), and they did this by making those they didn’t favor seem less human, therefore less “worthy” (called dehumanization).
Western Liberal culture culminating in Dr. King rests on and affirms the assumption that we’re all equally human, equally worth the best love (children of a loving Father in Heaven, so equal in God’s eyes & our own, according to the Reverend), and every single person should be treated equally as a consequence. It’s only “the content of our character” (how we behave) that should distinguish how we’re treated, but if we treat each other equally the way we each hope to be treated (“Love your neighbor like your self”), everyone prospers with work & commitment & enduring love.
So, are we saying the feelings of those nice people who happened to enter the United States unlawfully are unequally more important than the feelings of the nice people (immigrants & otherwise) who are already here legally, who are most vulnerable to the costs, and whose families are being crushed by the ill-timed but well-meaning people who’ve been landing in disadvantaged neighborhoods by the millions?
How can we say these people have feelings more valuable than others without dehumanizing everyone else, the same way the Nazi’s & Jim Crow Democrats did?
Kindly, 💛
Chris Miller | Apr 21, 2026 at 8:27 pm
We agree on one (and only one) point: this failure that is the immigration crisis is bipartisan in nature. Everything else you have laid out is a long-winded and bad-faith justification of violence towards individuals who break the law.
First: illegal immigration is not a felony. It is a civil offense. Violent arrest, incarceration without defined limits, and forced deportation to locations controlled by the federal government is not a proportional response to this “crime”. Second, ICE and DHS have shown that they do not give a damn about who they subject to violence or incarceration. They have conducted dragnet operations that have netted both undocumented persons and U.S. citizens alike, and U.S. citizens have been illegally detained. While you go on and on about how current immigrants going through the legal process are being hurt by undocumented people, ICE is illegally detaining those “legal” immigrants anyways.
So, in all this insincere drivel about “feelings” and somehow suggesting that undocumented people “dehumanize” others, you have failed to grasp the most important point of all this. The point is: the Trump administration is USING the bipartisan failure of the immigration crisis as an excuse to create a fascist paramilitary force. They do not give a damn about you, legal immigrants, poor Americans, or anyone else but the Epstein class. What they DO care about is normalizing paramilitary violence as a way of accomplishing political change in this country; and they want you to accept it, and blame undocumented migrants for the violence. In fact, there is no one to blame but the Trump DHS and it’s violent thugs.
So please, before writing more “culture war” nonsense, perhaps think about what is actually occurring in this country. The real events, the real human cost of all this violence. Get out from behind the computer and go get to know the people in your community. You will find that they do not want to “dehumanize” you… they just want to live their lives, same as you.
John Hedberg | Apr 22, 2026 at 5:28 am
Maybe you could try spending some time with people who are actually living the circumstances first, Chris, and then comment again?
I’m Latino & intersectional, I grew up in these very neighborhoods, and most of my life put me right in the center of these circumstances. I think I know pretty well the ‘grievances’ you seem intent on lecturing me about, grievances which you also seem to be appropriating, appropriating from sources you seem to trust more than the people who are actually living the circumstances.
If you want to look at the source of the violence, CBP and ICE are largely made up of men & women ‘of color’, many of whom live in the neighborhoods you’re pontificating about. Why are you ginning up fake statistics and violent hate rhetoric against ‘people of color’ who are very often trying to make their own neighborhoods safe, livable, and affordable again? 🤔💛
It’s political activists from outside the community who seem to be bringing their violence into this situation, a situation that’s not theirs, and which they often only ‘appropriate’ as an excuse to vent their own pent-up and suppressed feelings of grievance & vengeance, and not on behalf of anyone else. It’s an excuse, and isn’t it getting a little thin at this point?
Not that people don’t appreciate the help, of course, Chris. Our families endured much to thrive and take root in a totally foreign culture with love, passion, commitment, education, good humor, & a lot of help from God, but a friend is never unwelcome.
Are you being a friend, Brother? Is your ‘activism’ helping more, or hurting more? Why do you believe anonymous sources who are actually inciting the violence, rather than the people in the community who have to clean up after the ‘activists’? 💛
London Reynolds | Apr 22, 2026 at 9:19 am
Hi, John. Thanks for your thoughts.
I invite you to read the text of JR 10. The recommendations made in the resolution would supersede neither existing federal nor state legislation regarding immigration enforcement. Instead, the resolution asks that the University formally commit to protecting the Constitutional rights of our entire campus community.
No one would be receiving special privileges; the relevant Constitutional rights apply to all who are in the United States, regardless of documentation status. Similarly, every member of our campus community, regardless of documentation status, benefits from having these rights affirmed.
John Hedberg | Apr 22, 2026 at 11:59 am
If you think there isn’t a cost being paid for mass migration in already marginalized communities by every vulnerable family, that just means you’re shielded from the cost. That doesn’t mean people already living hand to mouth aren’t paying for your (apparent) pretense that nice folks who broke the law should have their needs placed above everyone else. We’re all paying higher prices as a result, so if you care about the families being crushed by inflation & lost job opportunities, who are barely making basic rent & utilities as it is, and who are priced out by those who, nice as they are, don’t seem aware of the suffering they’re causing their own neighbors (or in the case of some, they’re aware but don’t seem to care enough to take responsibility for the personal & financial stress their choices are causing), the compassionate answer, which places everyone’s needs & feelings on the same level, will be to treat everyone nicely, but to let families who cut in line, ahead of the millions who’ve been waiting to reunite with their families legally, know that they need to go back and do it legally too, like everyone else.
Isn’t that fair & humane to everyone, especially in keeping a law drafted and passed Constitutionally by The People who came here before us, people who already knew the needless overcrowding & inflation brought on by inconsiderate migration, because they emigrated themselves and experienced it first-hand?
Kindly, 💛
John Hedberg | Apr 23, 2026 at 7:43 am
London,
If you think there isn’t a cost being paid for mass migration in already marginalized communities by every vulnerable family, that just means you’re shielded from the cost. That doesn’t mean people already living hand to mouth aren’t paying for your (apparent) pretense that nice folks who broke the law should have their needs placed above everyone else. We’re all paying higher prices as a result, so if you care about the families being crushed by inflation & lost job opportunities, who are barely making basic rent & utilities as it is, and who are priced out by those who, nice as they are, don’t seem aware of the suffering they’re causing their own neighbors (or in the case of some, they’re aware but don’t seem to care enough to take responsibility for the personal & financial stress their choices are causing), the compassionate answer, which places everyone’s needs & feelings on the same level, will be to treat everyone nicely, but to let families who cut in line, ahead of the millions who’ve been waiting to reunite with their families legally, know that they need to go back and do it legally too, like everyone else.
Isn’t that fair & humane to everyone, especially in keeping a law drafted and passed Constitutionally by The People who came here before us, people who already knew the needless overcrowding & inflation brought on by inconsiderate migration, because they emigrated themselves and experienced it first-hand?
Kindly, 💛
(slightly updated)