ICE Detains Des Moines Public Schools Superintendent
What the what?!
ICE has arrested Andre Roberts, the superintendent of Des Moines Public Schools.
Yes…ICE claimed the superintendent is an illegal alien.
I’m just going to copy and paste the ICE press release because…my jaw is still on the floor:
ICE Des Moines today arrested Ian Andre Roberts, a criminal illegal alien from Guyana in possession of a loaded handgun, $3,000 in cash and a fixed blade hunting knife. At the time of his arrest Roberts was working as the Superintendent of Des Moines Public Schools despite being an illegal alien with a final order of removal and no work authorization.
During a targeted enforcement operation on Sept. 26, 2025, officers approached Roberts in his vehicle after identifying himself, but he sped away. Officers later discovered his vehicle abandoned near a wooded area. State Patrol assisted in locating the subject and he was taken into ICE custody.
Roberts has existing weapon possession charges from February 5, 2020. Roberts entered the United States in 1999 on a student visa and was given a final order of removal by an immigration judge in May of 2024.
The investigation into how Roberts acquired the handgun is being turned over to the ATF. It is a violation of federal law for those in the U.S. without legal status to possess a firearm and ammunition.
“This suspect was arrested in possession of a loaded weapon in a vehicle provided by Des Moines Public Schools after fleeing federal law enforcement,” said ICE ERO St. Paul Field Office Director Sam Olson. “This should be a wake-up call for our communities to the great work that our officers are doing every day to remove public safety threats. How this illegal alien was hired without work authorization, a final order of removal, and a prior weapons charge is beyond comprehension and should alarm the parents of that school district.”
ICE is grateful for the assistance of the Iowa State Patrol in apprehending this subject.
ICE arrest photo 👇🏻 pic.twitter.com/DScGqx6WWE
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) September 26, 2025
So…how did an illegal alien with criminal charges become a superintendent, let alone a superintendent of a state’s capital city?
Roberts came from Guyana but grew up in Brooklyn. The Des Moines Register also reported that he participated in the Olympics.
Roberts served as a superintendent before he became the Des Moines superintendent in July 2023.
Did you read the press release? This part: “Roberts has existing weapon possession charges from February 5, 2020. Roberts entered the United States in 1999 on a student visa and was given a final order of removal by an immigration judge in May of 2024.”
How…how did the existing weapons charges slip through the superintendent process? How did no one get alerted that the city’s superintendent had an order of removal over a year ago!?
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Comments
How many more are there in the United States just like this guy?
Entirely too many.
No background check?
Hard to believe in a job in a public school system. They always background check and any criminal record is problematic. Plus, in my experience, everybody fills out the I-9 which would have immediately flagged him.
When our small school lost it’s groundskeeper my girlfriend who sat on the school board asked if I would do it. I said sure but they wanted me to get a background check even though I’d mow on Sunday morning when no one was there. I told her never mind as that was silly.
Oh please, you don’t put a candidate for Superintendent of Schools, especially a large public school system like the Des Moines Public Schools, through the indignity of a background check. That’s only for teachers and staff that will be having actual contact with students. But I guarantee you that nobody on the school board, up to and including the Superintendent, ever had to under any such background check. Andre Roberts checked the correct boxes. He is ☑black and has a ☑Ed.D and there you go and here we are.
Since 2019 Iowa has a mandatory E verify requirement for public employers to include School Districts.
The School District was also required to submit I-9 form to the Feds to verify every employee had a work authorization or was a US Citizen.
Start nuking the employers both public and private which fail to follow or make good faith attempts to follow employment and immigration law. Definitely to include their Executives and Boards who are ultimately responsible for failures due to lack of attention/interest or oversight in establishing and maintaining functional systems to become compliant.
While Iowa has a Republican governor and the Republicans control both Houses of their Legislature, I do not know who controls Des Moines politically. However, if it is Leftist controlled Roberts had immunity from the law since he filled several categories of “Protected Class” and he thus ranks above US citizens. In the absence of specific Federal actions to actively enforce E-Verify and the I-9 requirement being accurately and truthfully fulfilled, the Left will ignore them and hope that like the majority of hostile foreign invaders that he will slip through the cracks.
I absolutely agree about the nukings, but do not expect them.
Subotai Bahadur
Whoever was responsible for the background checks should be fired for gross incompetence if it wasn’t done. If one was actually performed, but the results ignored or falsified, they should likewise be terminated for fraud. If there was not background check performed or requested, whoever approved the hiring without it should be terminated for gross incompetence and terminal stupidity.
Chances are extremely high that the results of the background check were flatly ignored by the school district. Because in the la-la land of public education the real goal is for the State to take custody of all children and turn them into Communist stormtroopers. Little Johnny may not how to read and right, and he may be convinced he is a girl and wants to saw off his genitals, but as long as he can set off bombs in churches and synagogues or assassinate “racists” then public education has accomplished its goal.
Superintendents make 300-100,000,000 a year depending on school district size
Lots of minorities in those positions
I read he was getting $305,000.
SMH
But he’s a doctor!
Of education.
Derp
Can anyone tell us what school? From student visa in 2022 to doctorate seems quite a leap unless I’m missing something,
The student visa was in 1999, not 2022.
Sounds like he should have had enough money to hire an immigration lawyer. Or at least enough to buy a plane ticket out of here before things got out of hand. Lack of a good getaway plan is always a problem.
Well, he can always request a self deportation flight.
For $100,000,000 yr I’ll do the job!
Maybe Roberts got a “Comey” after the review. “No reasonable prosecutor…”
I bet they used some executive search firm specializing in the academic space. Lefties all
Great work, public school system!
Diversity is our… EEEEEEK!
The next school board meeting might be interesting. /S
No way there wasn’t a background check done or required by policy and either way one of those was ignored. The employment of an illegal alien with a final removal order is big problem. He didn’t have authorization to be employed in the USA much less in the school system. I would hope there’s gonna be much disruption in Des Moines School District with follow up investigation into who and how this illegal employment occurred with additional indictments as a result. This guy was illegally employed as School Superintendent not as day labor or a dishwasher. I don’t wanna hear BS excuses about minor paper work discrepancies or technical violations in a flimsy attempt to minimize this. In fact suspending all Federal Funds to the District pending a meticulous investigation of ALL their processes, procedures and practices for other violations seems in order.
He may have had more in common with the student body so he would fit in. A role model and mentor.
Meh, load their ass up on plane with him for a return flight to whatever point of origin the students came from.
Have you been to Des Moines?
I suspect, because I have seen this tactic used before by a city council, that the school board will claim that since it is a personnel matter that it only can be discussed by the board i>in camera and that they will not speak of it to reporters or the public. And then they will stall and hope it will be forgotten.
Subotai Bahadur
The counter to that is to avoid naming this guy. Ask about District policy, external legal/regulatory requirements and oversight procedures to ensure they are adhered to.
Did the District fill out an I-9 on every employee annually as required? What position is charged with performing that? Which direct supervisor is responsible for ensuring the employee does so? What SR supervisor is responsible for checking it? How does the School Board conduct oversight of the Supervisory personnel and policies to ensure compliance?
Sure they’ll try to stall but asking the questions and following up with FOIA or local equivalent is first step. Then hound them at every subsequent Board meeting and start filing suit to enforce compliance with whatever State ‘sunshine’ laws exist.
The bigger issue is the DoJ. That’s who needs to be asking questions here. Set up a TF of DoJ, INS, Treasury, IRS, Dept ED, SSA to go through them with a fine tooth comb. Make them account for every $ with every I dotted and T crossed in all their paperwork. I am willing to bet this dude ain’t the only person employed without a work authorization. Then prosecute vigorously and relentlessly. No mercy and no quarter certainly no sob stories about ‘the children’ or’ we’re good hearted educators bad at paperwork’. Nuke them. They obviously didn’t comply with Federal and State law in their employment practices.
That works for them if your complaint is against the felon superintendent.
If your complaint is against the incompetent asses who hired him, it won’t work.
He may have received the special DEI background check, . . . wink, wink.
There is a liberal superintendent search firm based out of Howard U that seems to be working hand and hand with Teacher Unions. It is a scam and part of the liberal machine.
One take away is that this confirms that illegal aliens don’t hold jobs that Americans want or could do. And besides, who will pick the vegetables? /s
It also confirms that so called smart people do dumb things. He could have taken the free trip back to Guyana and then applied for immigration. Now he blew it. Given his flight from ICE, he clearly suspected this day would come.
“Well, he can always request a self deportation flight.”
Not anymore!
So… this is doing the job Americans won’t do?
He was black and called himself, Doctor. That was enough.
There seem to be a lot of missing pieces to this story.
“grew up in Brooklyn” but “entered the United States in 1999 on a student visa” does not compute.
His CV would make interesting reading.
Oddly, the legacy media is all over this story. I suspect they view it as a tragedy.
I devoutly hope that ICE didn’t get the wrong guy.
Looks as if Robert’s past hasn’t been a problem for him getting many jobs in the education field.
Source:
https://web.archive.org/web/20250926232357/https://www.dmschools.org/departments/administration/ian-roberts/
It appears that he was brought here as a child and grew up here, then left and came back on a student visa. And that he had work authorization until 2020.
The school district seems to have been under the impression that he was a citizen, so my read is that far from being “undocumented” he is very much documented, and is in possession of all the documents needed to “prove” citizenship. Whoever did the background check would naturally have taken those documents at face value, for lack of any reason to suspect otherwise.
Yet another example of why “undocumented” is not the right word to use for illegal immigrants.
Did he even have to leave and come back? Is it possible he grew up here in a parent’s visa and then had to get his own only when he turned 18? (I’ve never dealt with visas,)
Found his PhD
Dr. Roberts proudly shares that he was born to immigrant parents from Guyana, and spent most of his formative years in Brooklyn, NY. He graduated with a B.S. degree from Coppin State University, earned Masters degrees from St. John’s University and Georgetown University, and received his doctorate in Urban Educational Leadership from Trident University.
Trident University International is a private, for-profit online university based in Chandler, Arizona. It is a member of the American InterContinental University System and accredited by the Higher Learning Commission.
A step to the side of getting a doctorate from a real school although as well know one in education is crap no matter where it’s from. After al Bill Cosby had one and so did Dr Jill
Re all the people asking about background checks, I-9, etc:
of course they are going to deny everything
take those pos to court
hold them individually responsible for this harm to children
as obama would say
violence towards children
What harm to children? No harm at all has resulted from this. And he had documents; they weren’t to know they weren’t valid.
I believe that Baker-Eubanks did the background check, but they claim they were not asked to provide the criminal history.
I-9 is annual requirement. Iowa requires E verify for prospective and current employees in public sector since 2019.
Now if this guy has been using stolen SSA# and fraudulent ID that’s one thing but his removal order would have been pickup up on with follow up on E verify.
No mercy for School District Board if they try passing the buck to a 3rd party contractor. They’re still responsible for oversight and ultimately on the hook for failures to comply. Doesn’t matter who they chose to do X….all that matters is the Board has a responsibility to ensure X is complied with and they failed.
thanks for running this I didnt see the article and commented on another article about this!!
again,,thank
this story is indicative of the lefty agenda
make it stop gop !!!
defund now!!!
Barry and Big Mike chose the Iowa state school superintendent
A Woke white woman
Let me tell you how DES MOINES hires their school superintendents. RESUMES NOT REQUIRED – JUST SEND IN A PHOTOGRAPH!
The committee meets to looks at the photos. Acceptable photos are placed in one pile. All other photos are put in a different pile that is put in a circular file storage holder [to be emptied at the end of the day].
Clear enough?
Not The Bee discloses today that this guy’s history reads like a season of Lupin. They have one of his old booking photos, where he is looking scholarly indeed.
About the only thing they haven’t pinned on him yet is eating the neighbors’ dogs and cats, and that’s because they ran out of investigators.
He was hired to promote DEI, and combat “LGBTQ suppression.”
Plus — the cherry on the cake — the chair of the school board that hired him is Michelle Obama’s old chief of staff. There’s one token white male on the committee, and he and the rest are… well, exactly what you’d expect.