Texas Teacher Confused About Twitter Kept Trying to Report Immigrant Students to Trump

By Rafi Schwartz, Splinter

05 June 19

Fort Worth, TX, teacher was put on administrative leave and could lose her job for sending a series of anti-immigrant tweets to President Donald Trump in what she mistakenly believed was a private conversation, the Washington Post reported today.

Amon Carter-Riverside High School english teacher Georgia Clark reportedly sent a series of messages to the president’s Twitter account last month asking for “assistance in reporting illegal immigrants in the FWISD public school system” and claiming that “Fort Worth Independent School district is loaded with illegal students from Mexico,” according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

“Anything you can do to remove the illegals from Fort Worth would be greatly appreciated,” she wrote in one message.

After Clark’s tweets—sent from a now-deactivated Twitter account—started getting attention, the district launched a review of her behavior, during which she admitted the account was hers.

“Ms. Clark stated she did not realize the tweets were public,” the review said, according to a copy obtained by the Post.

In a message posted to the school district’s Facebook page last week, Superintendent Kent Scribner addressed the issue, although he did not refer to Clark by name. He wrote:

In the past 24 hours, there has been much talk in the news and on the Internet about the use of social media by our staff. Our mission is to prepare ALL students for success in college, career and community leadership. Let me reiterate our commitment that every child in the District is welcome and is to be treated with dignity and respect. As we conclude the school year this Friday, please know we take this promise very seriously and your child’s safety and well-being are always our number-one priority. Thank you.

This is not Clark’s first time facing administrative action for allegedly bigoted, anti-immigrant behavior. As the Star-Telegram reported, Clark was suspended and relocated from a different school in five years ago, when she referred to Latinx students at the school as “little Mexico.” According to one student who reported her behavior to the district, she also separated the students in her class by race with “the Mexicans on one side and the white and black people on another side.” The Post also reported she was already under investigation at Carter Riverside for allegedly telling one student to “show me your papers that are saying you are legal” in order for that student to go to the restroom. (She denied the allegations to investigators, per the paper.)

In a brief statement to Newsweek, Clark declined to comment on the specifics of her tweets or their intended recipient but said, “As the editor of my college newspaper years ago (Vietnam era), I know there is always another side to the story.”

According to district spokesman Clint Bond, there will be a school board meeting Tuesday to determine whether Clark will continue to teach in Forth Worth.