Federal immigration agents arrested a man near San Diego City College this week after stopping his vehicle just blocks from campus, and a passenger who fled the scene ran onto school grounds before officers pulled back. The Department of Homeland Security says the driver was not a student and was never arrested on campus. San Diego City College says its own enrollment records say otherwise.
According to KPBS, DHS officials identified the arrested driver as Renatho Kemsley Casseus and stated he entered the United States on May 12, 2023, through El Paso, Texas. That claim directly conflicts with San Diego City College President Ricky Shabazz's statement that district records confirm he was an enrolled student, leaving his status disputed between federal and local officials.
The stop happened near 16th and C Street, close to the campus, according to Fox 5 San Diego. ICE agents pursued a passenger from the stopped vehicle who fled onto San Diego City College grounds, but the outlet reports agents stopped the pursuit upon realizing they were entering a college campus. The San Diego Community College District believes both the passenger and driver were students, per the same report, and said the intrusion was disruptive, unwelcome, and in conflict with the district's core values.
Campus Stayed Open as District Responded
Classes continued as scheduled and the San Diego City College campus remained open throughout the incident, the station's report notes. SDCCD said it reached out with counseling and legal services to support students and employees affected by the activity, while declining to release further details about those impacted, citing confidentiality and FERPA-related privacy protections, according to the San Diego City College Undocumented Resource Center.
SDCCD said no one should feel threatened at their school or place of work, adding that all students and employees are welcome and that the district has a long history of serving immigrant, refugee, and asylum-seeking communities, per the same account. DHS, for its part, alleged the arrested individual was an undocumented Haitian immigrant who had been released by the Biden administration and whose case will be heard before an immigration judge.
Why Campuses Are No Longer Off-Limits
The confrontation reflects a sharp legal shift that took effect last year. The Department of Homeland Security rescinded its 2021 “Protected Areas” policy on January 20, 2025, eliminating federal guidelines that had restricted civil immigration enforcement at schools, higher education institutions, healthcare facilities, and places of worship, according to the National Immigration Law Center. Previously, agents needed prior headquarters approval or exigent circumstances before acting in those spaces.
California lawmakers moved to counter that shift at the state level. Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 98 into law in 2025, requiring communication to pupils, families, faculty, staff, and other school-community members when an immigration enforcement agent is present at a schoolsite, per the California Department of Education. Under California law, campus police and college-district employees are barred from participating in, assisting with, or coordinating ICE enforcement and must require agents to present a valid judicial warrant before entering non-public campus areas, according to guidance from Saint Mary's College.
A Record Year for Border-Area Enforcement
Federal agents conducted 1,964 arrests across San Diego and Imperial counties in July alone, a 50 percent jump over June and the highest monthly total of the year, based on data compiled by the Deportation Data Project. The broader period was marked by an intensified regional enforcement push between January and August.
Haitian nationals face a specific new legal vulnerability tied to that enforcement wave. Following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June, the Trump administration officially terminated Temporary Protected Status for roughly 500,000 Haitian immigrants nationwide, according to Scripps News, after DHS argued the protection was meant to be temporary.
District Had Already Been Bracing for This
SDCCD trustees were not caught entirely off guard. During a May 14 board meeting, trustees reviewed campus immigration protocols after learning ICE agents had previously staged enforcement activity on the Santa Barbara City College campus, according to the San Diego Community College District, which led to updated district safety reporting protocols.
The San Diego incident also fits a pattern seen elsewhere. In June, federal agents arrested a 48-year-old student directly on the Edmonds College campus in Washington state, one of several ICE actions on college grounds nationwide since the policy change, as Hoodline previously reported; that college also reviewed its safety protocols afterward.
