Months after the federal immigration arrest of former Des Moines Public Schools Superintendent Ian Roberts, an Iowa Senate subcommittee advanced legislation Wednesday to bolster verification steps in educational credentialing and hiring processes to ensure a person is lawfully eligible to work and live in the U.S.
Senate Study Bill 3015 would require the Iowa Board of Educational Examiners to require all applicants for new and renewing licenses to provide information about their lawful presence in the country. Education professionals who do not have license renewal requirements are required to submit evidence of their ability to stay and work in the U.S. to the BOEE every five years in order to remain licensed.
Additionally, public school boards, those overseeing charter schools and innovation zone schools and authorities in charge of nonpublic schools would be required to verify the identity and employment eligibility of all individuals who accept a job offer at their institution.
The measure is responding to the immigration arrest of former DMPS superintendent Ian Roberts. Roberts, a citizen of Guyana according to court records, was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in September during a “targeted enforcement operation.” He had been given an order of removal by an immigration judge in May 2024 and faced previous criminal charges, according to U.S. Department of Homeland Security reports.
Both the Des Moines school district and Iowa state government have faced criticism for failing to identify Roberts’ immigration status and employment eligibility. The superintendent was hired by DMPS in 2023, and had his administrator license approved by the state regulatory agency in July 2023.
The Des Moines school board is suing JG Consulting, the firm contracted in its superintendent search, which led to Roberts’ hire, as his immigration status and previous criminal charges were not flagged. Iowa Auditor Rob Sand also received a request in October to audit the Iowa Department of Education and state BOEE in relation to Roberts’ licensing.
Gov. Kim Reynolds issued an executive order in October requiring state government departments to use the federal E-Verify and Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (SAVE) database to verify immigration and work statuses of people seeking state jobs as well as state occupational and professional licenses.
The bill discussed Wednesday would not codify this executive order, Sen. Lynn Evans, R-Aurelia, said, but takes language already existing in Iowa Code and “enhances” it by making certain verification processes required instead of optional. He said that enacting the bill could mean the BOEE and school districts use services like E-Verify and SAVE for verification processes, but other systems could be used in the future.
“When working on drafting this bill, we intentionally did not name a product … as either potentially better products or better data systems become available, we want Iowa Code to be prepared to allow for those as well,” Evans said.
Sen. Cindy Winckler, D-Davenport, said she had questions on the use of E-Verify in this process, as the system has resulted in “false positives,” incorrectly labeling some people as being in the country unlawfully.
“That concerns me because there’s no appeal process in the bill if in fact they are misidentified,” Winckler said.
Emily Piper, representing the Iowa Association of School Boards, said the organization is concerned about the specific language used in the bill, saying “there is a distinct difference between ‘lawfully present’ and ‘authorized to work.’” Refugees, for example, may be legally present in the U.S. but not have a work authorization. At the same time, there are foreign teachers who are not “lawfully present” in the U.S. but are authorized to work through state partnerships, Piper said, pointing to an Iowa Department of Education partnership with some universities in Spain that allows teachers from Spain to teach Spanish in Iowa schools through an exchange program.
She said the group’s recommendation would be to change the language to focus on work authorization, which she said was the issue at hand.
“You can’t be authorized to work if you aren’t legal to be here, but we do have out-of-country folks who do have that authorization,” Piper said.
Other lobbyists with education organizations echoed Piper’s comments, calling for clarification of the language. Evans told reporters it is “worth looking into” this language change to ensure the bill has its intended effect.
Separate immigration bills advance
There were two other measures related to immigration that advanced through subcommittee meetings Wednesday. Immigrants and advocates with the Iowa Migrant Movement for Justice spoke against House Study Bill 552, a bill that would ban cities and counties from issuing local identification cards to residents. The measure includes exceptions that allow local governments to issue employee IDs, and also allow authorized counties to issue forms of ID like driver’s licenses, nonoperator’s identification cards and identification devices for persons with disabilities.
Johnson County’s community ID program is one of the main initiatives in Iowa that would be affected by this measure. The community identification card cannot be used to vote, get a driver’s license, board an airplane or purchase alcohol or tobacco. But supporters of the Johnson County program said it plays an important role in many people’s lives, as they use the local ID when interacting with schools, law enforcement and local government agencies.
Another Iowa Senate subcommittee advanced Senate Study Bill 3045 Wednesday, a bill requiring county auditors to use the SAVE database to verify the U.S. citizenship and voter eligibility of people registering to vote. If a person’s citizenship status cannot be confirmed, the individual cannot be registered to vote — but they are allowed to appeal the decision to the district court.
