A new report describes how some U.S. citizen students are avoiding federal financial aid because they fear submitting FAFSA data could put their undocumented parents at risk. The story centers on student interviews and analysis tied to data-sharing concerns and the fallout from changing federal data practices. The report explains that FAFSA is required for most federal aid and that the Education Department is not supposed to share information with immigration enforcement agencies. Still, students—such as one Los Angeles high school senior described as declining to complete FAFSA after noticing the acknowledgment about parents’ lack of Social Security numbers—say they believe the risk is too high. It also points to evidence that FAFSA completion is dropping in immigrant communities, including California data cited as showing an 8% decline in high school students from mixed-status families completing FAFSA between 2025 and 2026. For admissions leaders and student support offices, the immediate development is a measurable reduction in aid access behavior linked to immigration enforcement anxiety—an enrollment and equity threat that runs through financial aid processing rather than classroom outcomes.