They sent their children to their Denver school regularly until late February, when González’s phone lit up with messages claiming immigration agents were planning raids inside schools. That week, they kept their son home.
“We have a Romania to build together, regardless of political choices,” he said.After Dan is sworn in as president, he will face the challenge of nominating a prime minister who can garner the support necessary to form a government, no small task in a country whose political landscape is now fragmented.
As winner of Sunday’s race, Dan will be charged with nominating a new prime minister after Marcel Ciolacu stepped down following the failure of his coalition’s candidate. The presidential role carries a five-year term and significant decision-making powers in national security and foreign policy.Many observers saw Sunday’s vote as crucial to maintaining Romania’s place within Western alliances, especially as the war continues in neighboring Ukraine and the continent
as the United States’ commitment to European partners has waned under US President Donald Trump.While Dan is a staunch advocate for Romania’s strong membership of the EU and NATO, his civic and political background means he has limited foreign policy experience.
Claudiu Tufis, an associate professor of political science at the University of Bucharest, says what makes Dan unique in Romania is that he’s “not taken the traditional route to being a politician, he’s coming from the civil society.”
“There are certain advantages, but there are also certain disadvantages,” he told The Associated Press. “He doesn’t really have any foreign affairs experience. I am not sure that he actually paid a lot of interest to what was happening outside Romania.”that had limited immigration enforcement at schools.
The Denver school districtover that reversal, saying attendance dropped “noticeably” across all schools, “particularly those schools in areas with new-to-country families and where ICE raids have already occurred.” A federal judge ruled in March the district failed to prove the new policy caused the attendance decline.
Data obtained from 15 districts across eight additional states, including Texas, Alabama, Idaho and Massachusetts, showed a similar decline in school attendance after the inauguration for a few weeks. In most places, attendance rebounded sooner than in Denver.From 2022 to 2024, more than 40,000 Venezuelans and Colombian migrants