UC applicants expressed concerns about attending college following recent immigration crackdowns by President Donald Trump’s administration.

Trump promised to target immigrants without permanent legal status through mass deportations in his second term, signing an executive order Jan. 22 to declare a border emergency. High school students have led walkouts across California in response to deportations.

The Trump administration has also sought to revoke student visas on university campuses, allegedly targeting pro-Palestine protesters. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a press conference March 27 that at least 300 students had their visas revoked by the administration.

The UC Office of the President announced Friday that the Trump administration revoked the visas of several students across the University. The revocations have impacted at least 19 UCLA students and alumni as of April 10, said Undergraduate Students Association Council President Adam Tfayli.

[Related: Trump administration revokes visas of multiple UCLA, UC students]

A report from RepresentLA – an organization that seeks to provide legal assistance for immigrants – found that 19% of all Angelenos are either without permanent legal status or living with someone who is. Furthermore, an estimated 36,000 people lacking permanent legal status and under the age of 16 live in Los Angeles County, according to the Migration Policy Institute.

A high school senior at Westbrook Academy in South Gate – a city in southeastern LA County – and incoming first-year student said they felt the college application process could single out those with nonresident status, specifically with questions pertaining to students’ parents.

The student, who was granted anonymity due to fear of retaliation from the federal government, added that the FAFSA asked questions about their parents’ IRS information. They said this set off alarm bells in their head.

“I took that as … ‘What if my parents get deported or something because they’re immigrants?’” they said. “I was scared, but … I wanted to go to college ever since, so it was either not applying or taking that risk to apply.”

Fatima Garcia, a senior at Taft Charter High School in Woodland Hills – a neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley – who applied to UCLA, said raids by United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents have led to changes in her higher education aspirations.

“It’s definitely made me want to shrink my college pool, because in the worst-case scenario, I want to know that I’ll be able to come home within an hour or two of where I’m going to college – just so I can regroup with my family and figure out our next steps,” she said. “Before, I did want to venture out of state, but now I’ve been looking at colleges and hoping that I get into some that are at least not that far away.”

[Related: Undocumented students share fears of deportation under second Trump administration]

A UC Office of the President spokesperson said in an emailed statement that the University is closely monitoring actions by the federal government that could impact students. They added in the statement that the UC is open to all students, regardless of their immigration status.

UCPD will not actively detain students on the basis of their immigration status, nor will they work with ICE unless legally required to do so, according to the UC’s FAQs for University employees about possible federal immigration enforcement action.

“Jurisdiction over enforcement of federal immigration law rests with the federal government and not with UCPD,” the FAQs read. “UC Police are devoted to maintaining a safe and secure environment to support the University’s research, education and public service missions. University of California police departments will not divert their resources from this mission to enforce immigration laws, unless legally required to do so.”

Monroe Gorden Jr., UCLA’s vice chancellor of student affairs, said in a meeting between Undergraduate Students Association Council members and other UCLA administrators that the university is trying to limit contact with federal agencies, according to meeting minutes obtained by the Daily Bruin.

However, he added that the university would not notify students via BruinAlert if ICE was present on campus, and the university may only inform students after the fact, according to the minutes.

[Related: Students who had visas revoked were previously arrested, USAC meeting reveals]

The Westbrook Academy student said the Trump administration’s cuts to funding at universities have also changed their college plans. They said they had originally wanted to go out of state, but they fear these cuts may affect financial aid – making out-of-state options unaffordable.

Kirk Sharma, a teacher at Herbert Hoover High School in Glendale and a UCLA alumnus, said he has picked up on many of the difficulties faced by his students who lack permanent legal status or have parents who lack that status.

“I have some students who I’ve spoken with who – they don’t know if their father is going to be deported or not,” he said. “It’s tough when a child … has to make decisions about, ‘Is it selfish for me to go to college?’”

For students such as Garcia and the Westbrook Academy students, universities’ responses to the concerns of immigrants without legal status have become a factor in application decisions, and it is important to them that universities work to help students in those positions.

“There’s a lot of difficult calculations … that people have to consider, and I don’t want to accuse them (universities) of moral cowardice or something like that, because I don’t fully understand,” Sharma said. “But it does seem to me that they have a responsibility to provide additional services for those students.”

Contributing reports from Alexandra Crosnoe, Sam Mulick and Shiv Patel, Daily Bruin staff.