Johnson County Community College is now requiring students to present proof of U.S. citizenship or legal immigration status in order to enroll in adult education courses.
The move appears to be a response to a directive issued last month by the U.S. Department of Education under President Donald Trump that said career, technical and other adult education institutions must take steps to “ensure that non-eligible illegal aliens do not receive assistance or payments from federally funded programs.”
“In response to current Federal requirements, starting July 28, 2025, students will be required to present the most recent documentation of their current US citizenship or immigration status as part of the course registration process.”
Documentation could include a Real ID, a birth certificate, a U.S. passport or other immigration documents. A link provided in the college’s notification lists other commonly used immigration documents, like naturalization papers and green cards.
JCCC is conducting “verification” appointments
In an email sent to Johnson County Adult Education, or JCAE, staff members on Monday, July 28, JCAE program director Leslie Dykstra stated that all returning adult education students had been notified of the change.
“Students will be allowed to register or complete a student questionnaire informing us of their desire to study with us,” Dykstra said in her email.
After that, she said all adult education students would have to sign up for “verification appointments,” which were scheduled to occur between Tuesday, Aug. 5, and Friday, Aug. 8, to “determine qualifications to receive adult education services” at JCCC.
Dykstra asked any JCAE staff members or instructors “available to work during this time to support us in this process” to contact their program coordinator.
Chris Gray, JCCC’s vice president for strategic communications, said in an emailed response to questions, “JCCC’s compliance with federal requirements in this matter allows us to continue to serve qualified individuals for our JCAE programs.”
Gray noted that the college’s adult education program receives approximately $700,000 in federal grant funding annually, money that could be stripped away if JCCC was found to be out of compliance with the Trump administration’s rules.
One JCCC instructor has resigned
The new citizenship and immigration requirements were enough to prompt Daniel Tyx to quit his part-time job at JCCC.
He said his students hailed from at least 30 countries. They ranged from highly skilled doctors and lawyers looking to land similar jobs in the U.S., to younger students looking to use JCCC as a springboard to a four-year college.
“For a lot of them, it’s their dream to attend community college,” Tyx said. “They always come to class on time. They are always excited to be there. They always do their homework. It’s very important to them being students, it’s part of their identity.”
He acknowledged the position JCCC is in with the directive from the Trump White House, but he said he wished the college had fought harder against implementing the new requirements “until it became inevitable.”
“When I accepted the job [last year] my first question was, ‘Is JCCC going to serve all students?’ and at that time the answer was, ‘Yes,'” he said. “And so I felt comfortable taking the job at that time, but now I started reading the writing on the wall that we were no longer going to be an equal access program.”
He said that after the college announced it would begin requiring proof of citizenship or legal immigration status, students began reaching out to him “devastated” and “confused.”
Some of them told him they would not be able to continue on at JCCC, he said.
“The government always says [community college] is a public benefit, but it doesn’t feel that way to me right now,” he said.
Heather Morgan, the executive director of the Kansas Association of Community College Trustees, representing the leaders of Kansas’ 19 community colleges, said they are “excited to continue to provide adult education services to the population deemed eligible by the federal government.”
“If a student is unable to receive adult basic education services we will strive to connect them with other services which can meet their needs,” she said in an emailed response to questions.
Though Tyx said he felt JCCC was “trying to get ahead of things” and set up verification processes early, Morgan said “all colleges have been instructed to ensure they are in compliance with all federal guidance.”
“We are thankful that the federal funding was released which enables us to serve students who are eligible for adult basic education services,” she said.
It seems a reasonable question given the insulting intimidation directed toward Lenexa City Council member Melanie Arroyo after a tipster left a voicemail at the Kansas Bureau of Investigation. The KBI forwarded the information to Lenexa police, who forced the people’s elected representative to show them her papers. Surely Kobach can do the same for Kansans. You know, just to put our minds at rest.
Turns out that Arroyo had testified in February against Senate Bill 254, legislation that would have barred undocumented students from receiving in-state college tuition rates. She also wrote an op-ed column for the Kansas City Star about her experiences. In both testimony and column, she mentioned overstaying her visa but noted her status had been resolved.
So what on Earth was there to investigate?
What obligates the KBI — overseen by Kobach — to decide a random voicemail is worthy of Lenexa police’s attention? Surely they don’t forward every random call that comes in. Surely their actions don’t have anything to do with Arroyo’s name or ethnicity or public opposition to anti-migrant propaganda. Surely.
Kansas Reflector editor Sherman Smith‘s must-read story suggests that all agencies and officials involved have tried to pass the buck.
KBI spokeswoman Melissa Underwood said the agency doesn’t investigate immigration questions, so “the information was sent to the Lenexa Police Department for follow-up as they deemed appropriate.” Lenexa city attorney Sean McLaughlin tried to dodge responsibility too, saying a city ordinance required citizenship for officeholders. Police were just doing their jobs, even though there wasn’t any evidence to suspect Arroyo of anything.
“Just because evidence doesn’t exist doesn’t mean we don’t investigate,” McLaughlin told Smith.
Here’s my challenge to state and local law enforcement. If there’s no threshold at all, if agents can be dispatched to harass public officials based on innuendo, let’s welcome more elected lawmakers to the party. They can hop into Arroyo’s shoes and see how they like it.
I ask once again: Do we actually know that Kobach is a U.S. citizen?
He might be one, sure. It even looks likely, based on his biography and multiple terms in public office. One assumes that Gov. Laura Kelly’s opposition research team would have ferreted out any scandals back in 2018.
But we don’t know for sure.
I haven’t seen his birth certificate. He wrote a book about South Africa and studied overseas, at Oxford University in Great Britain. And notably, in his testimony supporting SB 254, he doesn’t make his U.S. citizenship absolutely clear. If that was a problem for Arroyo’s testimony — as McLaughlin suggested — surely it should be a red flag for Kobach’s.
Surely, sufficiently suspicious law enforcement officials would find reason to investigate, right? After all, they would just be asking for Kobach’s papers. That wouldn’t be a big deal, given that all of us carry around copies of our birth certificates at all times. It would sure be a relief for all of the rest of us to know that our attorney general is actually a citizen of the United States.
Kobach endorsed just this approach back in 2010. Then he was calling on President Barack Obama to release a detailed version of his birth certificate.
“It doesn’t have a doctor’s signature on it,” Kobach said, according to the Associated Press’ John Hanna. “Look, until a court says otherwise, I’m willing to accept that he’s a natural U.S. citizen. But I think it is a fair question: Why just not produce the long-form birth certificate?”
If you have read through all the above and think I’m full of it, fair.
But if you believe that Arroyo and Kobach are clearly different, that asking for papers from one makes sense while asking for papers from the other sounds silly, ask yourself why. One elected official enjoys the benefit of the doubt. The other elected official doesn’t.
One will go to the office tomorrow and never have to wonder about being racially profiled. He will enjoy institutional support from his state and party.
The other official will face uncertainty and fear, the knowledge that earning citizenship and winning office the “right way” counts for nothing when an anonymous message can threaten her livelihood.
Clay Wirestone is Kansas Reflector opinion editor. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.
Lenexa City Councilmember Melanie Arroyo revealed Tuesday that she was recently asked to prove her citizenship to local police after an anonymous caller questioned her immigration status.
Arroyo recounted the experience publicly for the first time at the Lenexa City Council meeting on Tuesday night. She said that Lenexa Police requested proof of her citizenship after the Kansas Bureau of Investigation passed along a concern from an anonymous caller who questioned her eligibility to hold public office.
Arroyo, who was elected to the city council in 2021 and previously announced she is not seeking reelection this year, was born in Mexico and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2018.
She used her experiences as an immigrant as an example in the Star column. She wrote that she came to the U.S. legally but overstayed her visa when she was in high school. Despite that, she said in the op-ed that she was able to graduate from college, have her immigration status resolved and get a job as a licensed therapist and counselor because Kansas allows undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates in college.
The piece resulted in a person leaving a voicemail at the KBI’s Lenexa office concerning Arroyo because of “public testimony she gave related to her immigrant background,” Melissa Underwood, a spokesperson for KBI, said in an email to the Johnson County Post.
“The caller requested someone check if she was able to hold office due to her status,” Underwood said. “Since the KBI does not typically investigate immigration-related matters, unless there is another alleged criminal violation, the information was sent to the Lenexa Police Department for follow-up as they deemed appropriate.”
Lenexa police chief called Arroyo
After the KBI handed the case down to the Lenexa Police Department, Arroyo said Lenexa Police Chief Dawn Layman called her on July 25 to let her know that a detective would be reaching out to her to request proof of her citizenship. The conversation was friendly, Arroyo added.
“Just to highlight how casual, in a way, this conversation was: In the moment, she gave me the option to just email a copy of any sort of document I may have that proves my citizenship, and honestly, I have nothing to hide. So I said, ‘No, you know what? I will show you in person,'” she said during Tuesday’s meeting.
After getting off the phone with Layman, Arroyo said she contacted some friends, who felt uncomfortable about the request, which made her reflect on it.
“I was not alarmed, but at the same time, I could not quite discern the multitude of emotions I felt in that moment,” she said. “Later, I started to recognize that the reason why this felt uncomfortable was because I was being asked to show my papers, and many people with an immigrant background would know that this carries a lot of political and historical weight.”
Following that, Arroyo hired a lawyer, who spoke with Bill McCombs, the Lenexa detective assigned to the case, about how they should proceed. After Arroyo and her lawyer provided proof of citizenship, the case was closed on July 29.
“We were able to determine that she is in fact legally qualified to hold the position of Lenexa City Councilmember. This information was communicated to the citizen who first brought the concern to the KBI. That was the end of our involvement in this matter,” Lenexa Master Police Officer Danny Chavez, a department spokesperson, said in an email to the Johnson County Post.
Both the Lenexa Police Department and city officials clarified that outside of this particular case, they do not investigate the immigration status of Lenexa residents.
A sign in support of Melanie Arroyo. Photo credit Andrew Gaug.
‘Harm was already done,’ Arroyo said
Arroyo, who maintained through her speech that she was not trying to shame Layman or the police department, felt like Lenexa didn’t understand the stress they caused her.
“At this point, the emotional and mental harm was already done, especially because at no point throughout the process was there any acknowledgement of the invasive nature of this request, or no consideration of verifying this case in a way that didn’t create discomfort or tension in my professional relationship with the Lenexa Police Department,” she said.
At the end of the two-hour meeting, Layman came to the podium and publicly apologized to Arroyo for how she approached her.
“I apologize if I made you feel that way. That was not my intent, and I think we worked together for a very long time, that I was trying to make things easier for you in the long run, I would welcome some additional conversation on this, since this is pretty much the first time I’m hearing about it today,” she said.
Lenexa City Attorney Sean McLaughlin (center). Photo credit Andrew Gaug.
City defends asking Arroyo questions
Lenexa city Attorney Sean McLaughlin spoke at Tuesday’s meeting and said the city was required to address concerns that Arroyo’s status as a city councilperson was not in line with Lenexa City Code 1-3-A-3, which requires councilmembers to be “Qualified Electors.”
As defined by Lenexa City Code 1-1-D-4, that means, in part, that they must be United States citizens.
“The individual reporting the concern stated that Councilmember Arroyo did not acknowledge naturalization in the testimony,” he said, referencing Arroyo’s Star column. “That individual pointed to the city’s ordinance, which requires that all councilmembers be qualified electors, which in turn requires that their United States citizens.”
The city had to follow through with the inquiry, McLaughlin said.
“While we did not assume there was a concern with Councilmember Arroyo’s naturalization, we felt we had no choice but to investigate the matter because it is in the city’s obligation to ensure compliance with our own ordinances,” he said.
While McLaughlin acknowledged Arroyo’s feelings, he defended how the city conducted itself.
“We conducted a standard investigation, as we would in any case, regardless of the individuals involved,” he said. “While it’s clear that Councilmember Arroyo feels we did not handle this in the right way, at the end of the day, city staff did exactly what is expected, and we stand behind our actions.”
Supporters of Lenexa Councilmember Melanie Arroyo clapped on Tuesday, Aug. 5, after she spoke. Photo credit Andrew Gaug.
“I considered having a private conversation about this situation with the city, but I’m making it public in the hopes that other municipalities hear my story and act to prevent the situation from happening to them,” she said.
While Arroyo said it would be unreasonable for the city council to discuss potential legislation at that meeting, she encouraged them to look into ways that would prevent Lenexa residents from being investigated like she was and protect vulnerable populations in the city.
“I would like to ask the city council to please support any viable measures we can put in place to protect our community from these wasteful reports, to continue to support the values of integrity and honor for our police department,” she said.
Mayor Julie Sayers (center). Photo credit Andrew Gaug.
Other councilmembers shared their support
After Arroyo spoke, five city councilmembers expressed their surprise at the investigation and support for her.
“Melanie, I had no idea this happened until just now,” Councilmember Courtney Eiterich said. “I hear you. I see you. I’m frustrated that someone would do that to you.”
Admitting that he was still processing what Arroyo said, Councilmember John Michael Handley expressed a need for safety in Lenexa.
“You should feel safe at home, in your community and at work, and civil service, as Melanie has done for so long, is work,” Councilmember John Michael Handley said. “She should feel safe to come here and do that work for all of Lenexa. She should feel safe in Lenexa, all of us should.”
Closing out the city council’s responses, Mayor Julie Sayers said she will work with the city on addressing issues to avoid what Arroyo experienced.
“The thing that we can be proud of as Lenexans is that we always stand together as a governing body, as a staff. We don’t point fingers at one another. We figure out problems together. We will do that with this,” she said. “If there’s something to be learned, we will have the conversation and we will learn it. And that’s my assurance to you, as the leader among this governing body and as our conduit for our staff, that we continue to have conversations to ensure that this never happens anymore.”
Jae Moyer (left) speaks in front of Lenexa City Council in support of Melanie Arroyo on Tuesday, Aug. 5. Photo credit Andrew Gaug.
About 25 people spoke in support of Arroyo
Following the city council’s remarks, about 25 members of the public spoke in support of Arroyo, including Jen Hill, of Roeland Park, one of Arroyo’s eighth grade teachers,
“These claims are not only entirely unfounded, they are a blatant attempt to discredit her based on her ethnicity, rather than recognizing the immense value of her service and her character,” she said. “Melanie is a U.S. citizen. She is fully qualified to hold the position to which she was elected, and she has done so with professionalism, empathy and integrity beyond her role in public service.”
Several speakers spoke of their Hispanic and Mexican background and their discomfort with Arroyo being asked for proof of citizenship.
“Let me tell you, anybody who is a Latino, we all feel like we’re targeted everywhere you go,” state Rep. Susan Ruiz, a Shawnee Democrat, said. “If something like this … has never happened to you, you don’t understand where it hits you. It hits us to our core, and it makes us feel like we don’t belong.”
Magaly Nieves, of Lenexa, who said she is the daughter of a Puerto Rican immigrant, detailed her own fears of being asked for her citizenship documents. She pushed Sayers to adopt new rules to avoid other city councilmembers from having their citizenship investigated.
“Make a law that says, ‘If you’re running for office in Lenexa, you have to prove your citizenship.’ That way, this is never a phone call to be made ever, ever, ever again,” she said.
Something I need to be reminded of often. Yes, I’m very lazy and also have executive problems up the wazoo (the difference? laziness is fun), but the cultural expectation of being productive every waking moment isn’t healthy either. And the business of feeding ourselves is especially fraught these days.
This is the same topic and screenshot that gave some of my chudliest chud haters such a meltdown after I posted it myself once, they raged at me for days and one by one dropped off of Tumblr forever. This subject kills idiots.
based on what we’ve found in Pompei the majority of roman citizens in the city got their food from fast food places like this
from a cultural perspective a roman’s typical daily schedual after work would look no different to a modern day worker commuting home and swinging by a fast food joint for chinese, kebab, or a pizza on the way as they unwound before bed
Human life remains the same down through the ages just as much as it changes
Thai people do a whole lot with a single, tabletop gas burner. A lot of cooking also is done outside the house, so a westerner looking for a “kitchen” may be confused. High-end homes and condos will even have two kitchens. One will be integrated with the living space and only for show. The real kitchen will be in a back room thats fully enclosed.
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