Trump told to ‘take care’ with his language on immigrants

The national teacher of the year on Wednesday handed President Donald Trump a letter from a Rwandan immigrant student that urged Trump to “take care” with his language about immigrant and refugee communities.

The letter was one of 45 delivered to the president by National Teacher of the Year Mandy Manning, written by students at the Newcomer Center at Joel E. Ferris High School in Spokane, Washington. Manning teaches English to refugees and immigrants.

Story Continued Below

Manning, speaking to reporters on the phone after the national teacher of the year ceremony at the White House, said the letter referring to Trump’s language was written by a female student from Rwanda.

Trump earlier this year reportedly denounced immigrants from “shithole countries.” He later denied using that specific language.

The Rwandan student told Trump “that she hopes he would model for others positive messaging around our immigrant and refugee communities,” particularly communities of color, because he serves as “a role model“ and “his words have a lot of weight,“ Manning said. The student stressed that Trump should “take care of those words,” Manning said.

The president instructed an aide to place the letters on his desk, Manning said. Manning said she also invited Trump to her school.

Manning gave the letters to the president after the ceremony. At the White House, she wore several pins on her dress, advocating the Peace Corps — of which she is a former member — the National Education Association and the annual Women’s March. Another read, “Trans Equality Now.”

Manning said she stressed in her remarks during the ceremony that all students “are wanted, that they are enough and that they matter.” She also urged others in the room to challenge any preconceived notions that they might have about certain cultures or groups of people.

Prior to the ceremony, Manning and the finalists for national teacher of the year participated in a “listening session” with Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and Labor Secretary Alex Acosta.

Manning described her day as positive.

“The White House really made every effort to create an experience for us that honored us, and it was really wonderful to be there,” she said.

During the ceremony, Trump didn’t specifically mention Manning’s work with immigrant and refugee students. But, he said, “Teachers like Mandy play a vital role in the well-being of our children, the strength of our communities and the success of our nation.”

“The job of a teacher is not only to instruct the next generation of workers but the next generation of citizens to teach our children to care for others, to think for themselves, to love their country, to be proud of our history and to be true pillars of their families and their communities,” he said during remarks. “Such an important job. There is no more important job.“

Jonathan Juravich, the 2018 Ohio Teacher of the Year and a finalist for national teacher of the year, said he told Trump that he teaches his students “about respect and empathy and that we as adults need to model these behaviors for our students.“

“That’s great. I like that,” Trump said, according to Juravich.

When asked whether the president models those behaviors, Juravich said that it’s “really important” for all adults to think about their actions.