By MORIAH BALINGIT, Associated Press Education Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — Not long after President Donald Trump took office in January, staff at CentroNía bilingual preschool began rehearsing what to do if Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials came to the door. As ICE became a regular presence in their historically Latino neighborhood this summer, teachers stopped taking children to nearby parks, libraries and playgrounds that had once been considered an extension of the classroom.

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And in October, the school scrapped its beloved Hispanic Heritage Month parade, when immigrant parents typically dressed their children in costumes and soccer jerseys from their home countries. ICE had begun stopping staff members, all of whom have legal status, and school officials worried about drawing more unwelcome attention.

All of this transpired before ICE officials arrested a teacher inside a Spanish immersion preschool in Chicago in October. The event left immigrants who work in child care, along with the families who rely on them, feeling frightened and vulnerable.

Trump’s push for the largest mass deportation in history has had an outsized impact on the child care field, which is heavily reliant on immigrants and already strained by a worker shortage. Immigrant child care workers and preschool teachers, the majority of whom are working and living in the U.S. legally, say they are wracked by anxiety over possible encounters with ICE officials. Some have left the field, and others have been forced out by changes to immigration policy.

At CentroNía, CEO Myrna Peralta said all staff must have legal status and work authorization. But ICE’s presence and the fear it generates have changed how the school operates.

“That really dominates all of our decision making,” Peralta said.

Instead of taking children on walks through the neighborhood, staff members push children on strollers around the hallways. And staff converted a classroom into a miniature library when the school scrapped a partnership with a local library.

The child care industry depends on immigrants

Schools and child care centers were once off limits to ICE officials, in part to keep children out of harm’s way. But those rules were scrapped not long after Trump’s inauguration. Instead, ICE officials are urged to exercise “common sense.”

Tricia McLaughlin, spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security, defended ICE officials’ decision to enter the Chicago preschool. She said the teacher, who had a work permit and was later released, was a passenger in a car that was being pursued by ICE officials. She got out of the car and ran into the preschool, McLaughlin said, emphasizing the teacher was “arrested in the vestibule, not in the school.” The man who had been driving went inside the preschool, where officials arrested him.

Flor Perez encourages her class of 2-year-olds in a walk around the school in lieu of outdoor walks around the neighborhood during school time at CentroNia in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

About one-fifth of America’s child care workers were born outside the United States and one-fifth are Latino. The proportion of immigrants in some places, particularly large cities, is much higher: In the District of Columbia, California and New York, around 40% of the child care workforce is foreign-born, according to UC Berkeley’s Center for the Study of Child Care Employment.

Immigrants in the field tend to be better educated than those born in the United States. Those from Latin America help satisfy the growing demand for Spanish-language preschools, such as CentroNía, where some parents enroll their kids to give them a head start learning another language.

The American Immigration Council estimated in 2021 that more than three-quarters of immigrants working in early care and education were living and working in the U.S. legally. Preschools like CentroNía conduct rigorous background checks, including verifying employees have work authorization.

Beyond the deportation efforts, the Trump administration in recent months has stripped legal status from hundreds of thousands of immigrants. Many of them had fled violence, poverty or natural disasters in their homes and received Temporary Protected Status, which allowed them to live and work legally in the U.S. But Trump ended those programs, forcing many out of their jobs — and the country. Just last month, 300,000 immigrants from Venezuela lost their protected status.

CentroNía lost two employees when they lost their TPS, Peralta said, and a Nicaraguan immigrant working as a teacher left on his own. Tierra Encantada, which runs Spanish immersion preschools in several states, had a dozen teachers leave when they lost their TPS.

Fear is affecting even those in the US legally

At CentroNía, one staff member was detained by ICE while walking down the street and held for several hours, all the while unable to contact colleagues to let them know where she was. She was released that evening, said the school’s site director, Joangelee Hernández-Figueroa.

Another staff member, teacher Edelmira Kitchen, said she was pulled over by ICE on her way to work in September. Officials demanded she get out of her car so they could question her. Kitchen, a U.S. citizen who immigrated from the Dominican Republic as a child, said she refused and they eventually let her go.

Edelmira Kitchen, a teaching artist at CentroNia, poses for a portrait in a classroom at CentroNia in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

“I felt violated of my rights,” Kitchen said.

Hernández-Figueroa said ICE’s heightened presence during the federal intervention in the city has taken a toll on employees’ mental health. Some have gone to the hospital with panic attacks in the middle of the school day.

When the city sent mental health consultants to the school earlier this year as part of a partnership with the Department of Behavioral Health, school leadership had them work with teachers rather than students, worried their anguish would spill over to the classroom.

“If the teachers aren’t good,” Hernández-Figueroa said, “the kids won’t be good either.”

Celenia Romero reads to her Prek-5 students as they play in the library at CentroNia in Washington, Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

It’s not just adults who are feeling more anxious. At a Guidepost Montessori School in Portland, Oregon, teachers observed preschoolers change in the weeks after an ICE arrest near the school in July. After pulling over a father who was driving his child to the school, officials encountered him in the school parking lot and tried to arrest him. In the ensuing commotion, the school went into lockdown: Children were pulled off the playground, and teachers played loud music and had children sing along to drown out the yelling.

Amy Lomanto, who heads the school, said teachers noticed more outbursts among students, and more students retreating to what the school calls “the regulation station,” an area in the main office with fidget toys kids can use to calm themselves.

She said what unfolded at her school underscored that even wealthy communities, like the one the school serves, are not immune from exposure to these kinds of events.

“With the current situation, more and more of us are likely to experience this kind of trauma,” she said. “That level of fear now is permeating a lot more throughout our society.”

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

His bone-crushing jaws ready, William frightfully honed in on his prey —  bathing suit-clad me. Crazily, I was willingly submerged in the Cage of Death, a clear plastic cylinder plunged into an adrenalin-jolting tank occupied by a pair of homicidal saltwater crocodiles.

At first, 15-foot-long, 1,521-pound William stealthily swam around the dunked cage while his aloof royal partner Kate lurked deeper in the water. The two-person-max Cage of Death — a thrill in Australia’s croc-centric city of Darwin — also encased my husband, who was gung-ho to do this and hmm, might be the more desirable target meat-wise, sparing me.

In Darwin, the Cage of Death gives brave humans a chance to see saltwater crocodiles just inches away. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

To get in this predator predicament, we descended a ladder into the cage that was suspended by chains and then swung by a monorail over the carnivores in their big pool. Dangling above, we were slowly lowered as croc-shared saltwater from below filled up to our chests. I thought I’d wet my wet pants. We’d have 15 everlasting minutes in this acrylic contraption that was already ominously scratched from crocodile claws and teeth. Wearing goggles, we maneuvered underwater in our cage to “swim” with the humongous, astounding assassins who glided close to us. Although I soon lost sight of William.

The Cage of Death is lowered into a tank with a waiting crocodile at Crocosaurus Cove in Darwin, Australia. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

That’s when my husband tapped me on the shoulder and pointed skyward. Standing up, we exhilaratingly came face-to-scaly-face with Willam, his massive head horizontally smack against the cage that was only 1.5 inches thick. I could’ve flossed his not quite pearly whites  just a finger’s length away; only earlier I read a sign saying a croc’s bite force is “equivalent to the weight of a large diesel truck.” William’s slit-shaped membrane-coated right eye hypnotically stared at his gawking entrees. I swear he sneered at us. But he might’ve been distracted — we couldn’t see but his handler at reptile park Crocosaurus Cove had been extending a pole to feed him his favorite non-human snack, crabs.

It’s ironic that Croc Cove saved 60-year-old Willam and a couple other “problem” salties from death — they were escapees from a commercial crocodile farm and instead of becoming wallets, they nabbed this starring role.

A sign outside the Crab Claw Island Resort reminds visitors of what lurks in Australia’s Top End. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Darwin is the tropical capital city and most populated of Oz’s Northern Territory, a vast, mostly uninhabited “outback” region and the must-visit “crocodile capital of the world.” The territory —  twice the size of Texas — is home to an estimated 100,000 wild “salties” (that’s what Aussies call them) and 260,000 people, which is roughly one salty for every couple with a baby. I’m from croc-less California, so there’s no such dangerous beasts lying on beaches, infesting rivers, creeks and harbors, eating you when you swim, and making cameos in public pools, women’s water aerobic classes and backyards. Very weirdly, it’s legal to keep a crocodile as a pet in Darwin if you have a permit and obey strict rules about its enclosure.

The murky Adelaide River in the Northern Territory is believed to contain more than 1,000 saltwater crocodiles. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Besides the Cage of Death, we boated alongside jumping crocs, soared in a helicopter over salties (and the Lost City and towering termite mounds), discovered but didn’t try an abundance of croc cuisine (szechwan crocodile dumplings), and perused countless croc merchandise (claw back scratchers, anyone?).

As she showed me beautiful Aboriginal paintings, I excitedly recounted some of this to Bryony Nainby, art curator at the impressive Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory. “Oh,” she said with a knowing look.“You’re a crocophile.”

In fact, I couldn’t wait to see the museum’s stuffed crocodile Sweetheart, a beloved icon who in life gained fame for attacking outboard motors.

 Croc around the clock

A souvenir T-shirt says it all in Darwin, part of Australia’s croc-invaded Northern Territory. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

The Aussies, perhaps the most easygoing folks on the planet, take it all in stride. This area Down Under is known as the Top End and its irrepressible quirkiness is a real hoot. Among notable milestones: The still-active Rocksitters Club, a group of mates who in 1974 started sitting on a Darwin rock and drinking beer for lengthy stretches, finally achieving a 12-day world record in 1980; the late Brahman bull Norman who was a beer-guzzling title winner at his owner’s Humpty Doo Hotel near Darwin; and the Darwin Ice Hockey Club which went undefeated for 32 years because the city didn’t have an ice rink then and the team never played a game. The “world champions,” however, starred in a humorous 2011 commercial for Vegemite, that strange dark spread Australians slap on their toast.

Crocodile Darwin is a company that sells its namesake products at the Mindil Beach Sunset Market. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

On our first afternoon, after checking into the contemporary Hilton Darwin, we set off for popular Mindil Beach, where the wacky 51st annual Beer Can Regatta took place a few months earlier. The usual Mindil Beach Sunset Market buzzed with over 150 colorful craft and food stalls on an embankment across from the Timor Sea.

A plethora of crocodile products are sold at Mick’s Whips at the Mindil Beach Sunset Market in Darwin. The prices are in Australian dollars. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

“The goods are real and the prices are unreal!” shouted Mick Denigan, owner of Mick’s Whips and “the world’s fastest whip cracker” with a record 127 cracks in 10 seconds wielding   two whips. Denigan, a rugged character in his late 50s, had just been outside his crocodile skin-draped Mindil booth, fiercely lashing kangaroo hide whips on the ground. For a few scary moments, I thought the sharp loud cracks were gunfire.

Got an itch? Crocodile claw back scratchers are sold in stalls at the Mindil Beach Sunset Market in Darwin. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Wild salties are protected by law but Denigan is a licensed crocodile hunter who, with government permission, can cull crocodiles or shoot those who have devoured cattle or endangered people. His retail wares included crocodile dog collars, croc stubby beer holders, croc skulls, croc tail key rings, croc tooth necklaces, croc purses, croc foot back scratchers and more. Other vendors peddled similar items and crocodile jerky. Crocs are also raised in farms near Darwin for products (high-fashion Hermes handbags) and vittles. At Mindil, you could dine on crocodile skewers with peanut sauce, croc burgers on brioche buns and creamy croc-vegetable pies.

Crocodiles can eat humans and vice versa. Burgers were on the menu at the Mindil Beach Sunset Market in Darwin, Australia. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

As evening approached, attendees flocked en masse from the Mindil market to sit on the sprawling beach. Four camels, topped with tourists, surreally padded by the shoreline as the sky glowed Halloween orange. When the last drop of the stunning sunset disappeared beneath the horizon, all 1,000 or so onlookers heartily applauded in unison. That’s a funny Darwin custom too.

A tourist caravan of camels strolls along Mindil Beach in Darwin, Australia, (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Snap-happy heights

In the morning, we hopped aboard a three-passenger Nautilus Aviation helicopter for a day exploring the Northern Territory (where “Crocodile Dundee” lived onscreen). Taking off,  pilot Jim Collins told me not to keep anything in my pocket because of strong winds — neither he nor I had a door. Nautilus also offers a Heli Pub Crawl that transports imbibers by air to four of the area’s unconventional bars.

A passenger helicopter from Nautilus Aviation finds a dandy parking place at Sandy Creek Falls in Litchfield National Park. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Even before our copter touched down in the desolate Top End, we spotted salties below in the croc-swarming Adelaide River. While Collins waited for us, we sailed on the Spectacular Jumping Crocodile Cruise with captain Shane Clugston patrolling for Casanova and Stumpy. Instead, we’d encounter Marilyn, Scooby, Snappy, Checkers, Lola and juvenile Bubba in the muddy river, and each time Clugston’s assistant swung a stick with buffalo meat or chicken over their snouts to provoke them to fling themselves vertically, a natural prey-snatching behavior. Some crocs looked bored at the bait, like “I’m not playing this game today.” A few ferociously jumped high in the air, causing a child onboard to squeal with delight.

Saltwater crocodiles, such as this one in the Adelaide River, have the most powerful bite force of any animal in the world.(Photo by Norma Meyer)

Salties had been hunted to near-extinction — there were 3,000 left — when protection laws were enacted in 1971. Now with 100,000 roaming, Clugston warned, “Always have the assumption that one is next to you — because there usually is.”

Crab Claw Island, in the remote Northern Territory, offers camping and cabins at its one resort… but be croc aware. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Returning to the clouds, we floated (or bounced) over never-ending untamed landscapes of woodlands, mangroves, rivers, and rocky cliffs. “It goes on and on and on,” Collins said about the Top End’s topography. He continued to our lunch locale, the casual Crab Claw Island Resort, which is all that’s on the isle and caters to mud-crabbing fishermen. It sits along picturesque Bynoe Harbour but don’t dare go for a dip. Salties will also hang on the beach. I sipped a frosty one in the pub and kept eyes peeled.

Known as the Lost City, these are not ancient ruins but weathered sandstone formations possibly dating back 500 million years. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

We’d soon whirl over part of breathtaking 579-square-mile Litchfield National Park. Under us rose the Lost City, apparent ruins of a mystical ancient civilization.The “city,” however, is actually comprised of gigantic eroded sandstone formations that mimic an archeological site. Elsewhere, hundreds of magnetic termite mounds covered the plains, eerily resembling tombstone-studded graveyards. Those mounds stood about six feet high while Litchfield’s church-like cathedral termite mounds imposingly reached up to 26 feet. Crafted by different species, the colonies were built by grass-cutting termites who added saliva, feces, and sand to construct palaces for their king, queen, nymphs, workers and soldiers.

Hundreds of grave-like magnetic termite mounds are seen from a helicopter in Litchfield National Park. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Litchfield is lauded for its sparkling waterfalls, and Collins swooped at a tilted angle over cascading wonders. (Remember, no door.) For the grand finale, he dramatically landed on a tiny rocky outcrop at magnificent Sandy Creek Falls.

Sprawling Litchfield National Park has a number of beautiful waterfalls, such as this one seen from a helicopter. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Back in Darwin I needed the scoop on Sweetheart, who was male.

“This fella would come up to small boats and dinghies, grab the motor and shake it and throw the people out into the water. But he never even bit anyone,” said Jared Archibald, history curator of the Northern Territory museum.

The preserved body of notorious crocodile Sweetheart is a main attraction at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

In 1979, Sweetheart was captured and sedated by rangers, but when he was being towed, his line snagged on a sunken log and he accidentally drowned. Jared’s father, taxidermist Ian Archibald, was called upon to prepare and stuff 17-foot-long Sweetheart for exhibition.

“We had his skull and his skin in a freezer on our back porch,” the younger Archibald recalled.

At Darwin Harbour, beachgoers can safely swim in a large lagoon separated by a seawall from crocodiles in the ocean. (Photo by Norma Meyer)

Around busy Darwin Harbour — named for English naturalist Charles by a former shipmate — up to 300 salties are caught in baited traps annually, most sold to crocodile farms. But no worries: At the bay’s stylish Waterfront Precinct, everyone can safely swim in a saltwater lagoon because a surrounding seawall keeps out crocodiles —  and venomous box jellyfish that can kill a person within five minutes. That’s another story.

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By Hadriana Lowenkron, Bloomberg News

President Donald Trump suggested he could seek to oust Federal Reserve governors appointed by President Joe Biden if their commissions were signed by autopen, in his latest bid to exert control over the central bank.

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The gambit is unlikely to come to fruition.

Previous Trump declarations that he was voiding Biden actions where the former president used an autopen have resulted in little more than eyerolls. Governors would be almost certain to mount a legal challenge to any effort to invalidate their Senate-backed appointments.

But the comments nevertheless represent the latest encroachment by the president on the independence of the central bank.

“I hear that the autopen may have signed those commissions,” Trump said during a political rally in Pennsylvania. “If they signed those commissions — now maybe I’m wrong, but we’re going to check.”

Presidents finalize an appointment by signing a commission after nominees are approved by the Senate to formalize their assumption of a federal office. Trump went on to suggest that an official he had appointed could be thrown “the hell out of here” had he similarly used an autopen. He asked Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who joined him at the rally, to investigate the issue.

“Would you check that?” the president continued. “Scott, okay, because I’m hearing that the autopen could have signed maybe all four, but maybe a couple of them — we’ll take two. So look at that.”

The Federal Reserve declined to comment.

Autopens have been used in multiple presidencies, and their usage can be traced back to the 1940s during Harry Truman’s administration.

In 2005, White House lawyers asked the Justice Department for an opinion on whether the president may sign a bill by autopen, which no president had done. The DOJ concluded that under the historical and legal meaning of the word “sign” in the early republic, “a person may sign a document by directing that his signature be affixed to it by another,” and that “the President need not personally perform the physical act of affixing his signature to a bill to sign it.”

Still, Trump’s comments were the latest signal the president is eager to assert influence over the Fed after months of frustration with the pace of rate cuts. Trump reiterated Tuesday he intends to bring change to the board, which is expected to announce whether it will cut interest rates at its December meeting on Wednesday.

The seal of the U.S. Federal Reserve Board of Governors is seen ahead of Chair Jerome Powell’s news conference at the Federal Reserve headquarters, following the Federal Open Market Committee meeting in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 17, 2025. (Jim Watson/AFP/GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/TNS)

That includes a new leader after Chair Jerome Powell’s term expires in May.

“We’re going to be looking at a couple different people, but I have a pretty good idea of who I want,” Trump told reporters on the flight to Pennsylvania. Trump has repeatedly hinted that Kevin Hassett, the director of the National Economic Council, could be his pick.

Trump earlier this year moved to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, citing claims she committed mortgage fraud. Cook has denied wrongdoing and filed a lawsuit to block her removal; the Supreme Court said last month it would hear oral arguments in the case in January.

In addition to Cook, Biden reappointed Powell, and appointed Vice Chair Philip Jefferson and Michael Barr as governors on the board. A fifth Biden appointee, Adriana Kugler, resigned from the Fed board in August, six months before her term was set to expire.

(With assistance from Amara Omeokwe.)

©2025 Bloomberg L.P. Visit bloomberg.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.