Students protest U.S. Customs and Border Protection participation at campus career fairs

Amid President Donald Trump’s crackdown on immigration and deployment of federal officers to cities across the country, students at Philadelphia-area colleges are protesting against the appearance of U.S. Customs and Border Protection at campus career fairs.

At least four local universities — Thomas Jefferson, Villanova, Temple, and Rowan — have faced opposition to allowing recruitment in recent months.

A petition circulated at Jefferson last week sought to keep CBP from appearing at a campus career event. CBP and ICE — both agencies that enforce immigration laws under the Department of Homeland Security — have been at the center of a national debate after two Minneapolis residents were killed by federal immigration enforcement agents in shootings now under investigation.

“Due to the harm CBP has caused to communities across the nation, it is abhorrent for TJU to accept CBP at their institution,” said an occupational therapy student who signed the petition and asked that her name be withheld, fearing retribution. “I don’t think any institution should be encouraging students to get involved in these kinds of agencies, given the current climate.”

But the petition has since come down, the student said, and CBP is not on the list of employers due to appear at the event, called the 2026 Career Day and Design Expo, on Thursday at the East Falls campus. Jefferson has not acknowledged that CBP was on the list initially or responded to questions on whether it was removed.

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CBP, which has offices in Philadelphia, has appeared at campus career events in the area in the past.

An email seeking comment from CBP’s media office was not returned.

At Rowan University in New Jersey earlier this month, the participation of CBP’s Trade Regulatory Audit Philadelphia Field Office in a career fair drew some student protest. Members of a student activist group distributed fliers speaking out against CBP during the fair, according to Rowan’s student newspaper, the Whit, and campus police and administration officials came to the scene.

The agency also reserved a table and came to a fall event at Rowan to share information about accounting-related auditing internships, said Rowan spokesperson Joe Cardona, and has done so at the public university for the last decade.

Rowan’s Rohrer College of Business Center for Professional Development hosts more than 200 employers each year, including local, state, and federal agencies as well as private-sector groups, he said.

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“The presence of any employer on campus does not constitute institutional endorsement of that organization’s policies or actions,” Cardona said. “Rather, it reflects our commitment to supporting student career exploration while upholding principles of open access and free expression.”

At Villanova, CBP pulled out of a career fair it had planned to attend earlier this month, according to the Villanovan, the student newspaper. The withdrawal followed criticism on social media about the organization’s planned appearance.

The organizer of an Instagram account that opposed the agency’s participation said they wished that Villanova had made the decision to disallow the group rather than the group withdrawing, according to the student newspaper.

“I think a lot of students will feel a lot safer and more comfortable attending this Career Fair,” the organizer said. “But it doesn’t take away the anger that this was ever something that was gonna happen.”

Villanova said in a statement that CBP‘s Office of Trade had participated in prior career events and that employers with prior participation were contacted “through standard outreach” about this year’s event.

Temple’s law school last semester had planned to host a “Coffee and Careers” networking event with a DHS and Immigration and Customs Enforcement lawyer but later canceled it, according to the Temple News, the student newspaper. The event was replaced with a talk on public interest law by Philadelphia City Councilmember Rue Landau.

DHS “chose to engage directly with students interested in DHS opportunities rather than participate in a scheduled career event,” Temple spokesperson Steve Orbanek said.

He also noted that “career fairs are university-sponsored events, and actions that disrupt these events may violate university policy and established on-campus demonstration guidelines.”