Violent student protests in France are a warning to America: ‘a cautionary tale’

Violent student protests in France are fueling new warnings about the consequences of open border immigration policies, with the unrest being framed as a “cautionary tale” for the United States.

“I would also say that since we’re sitting here in the great city of New York, it’s a cautionary tale,” Tomi Lahren, co-host of “The Big Weekend Show,” said Saturday.

She continued: “This is something we are learning from Europe, and we would do well to learn from Europe. They decided they wanted to have open borders. They decided they wanted diversity to be their strength, and of course Joe Biden tried that for four years. We are undoing that right now.”

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Police officers stand in front of burning garbage facing students during a protest against underfunded schools in Paris on Friday. (Aurélien Morissard/AP Photo)

Lahren posited that “when you let so many people into your country and out of your system, then the people who come from there are at some point going to get angry.”

She said anger often becomes misplaced and “they end up setting things on fire, which I think is stupid, no matter what you’re angry about, but it’s definitely those countries that say we’re going to become a global home for everyone, they end up paying the price, and it’s usually the ethnic French, or any other country, that end up paying the highest price.”

Paris students began protesting late last month against what they see as overcrowded classrooms, a shortage of teachers, long school days and deteriorating conditions, accusing the government of not investing enough in education.

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A student throws a tear gas grenade during a demonstration against underfunded schools in Paris on Friday. (Aurélien Morissard/AP Photo)

The protests began peacefully in the poorer suburbs of Paris, but quickly spread to Paris itself, then spread across the country to cities like Marseille, Strasbourg, Tours, Nantes, Toulouse and Lille, becoming increasingly violent as they spread.

The protests were also fueled by Thursday’s unveiling of the government’s 2027 budget, which showed that education spending will increase by only 1.7 percent, excluding teachers’ pensions, an increase below the rate of inflation, Reuters reported.

Rioters committed arson, vandalism, threw objects at police and even assaulted people in some cases, prompting authorities to respond with tear gas and rubber bullets.

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Students block the entrance to Lycée Voltaire in Paris as they protest against underfunded schools on Friday. (Aurélien Morissard/AP Photo)

More than 5,000 protesters were arrested this week across the country, according to Reuters, and more than 400 schools remained closed as of Friday.

Euronews reported on Friday that at least 65 school staff, including 40 principals, had been injured since the unrest began, along with around 170 students.

More than 100 high schools suffered what Education Minister Édouard Geffray called “serious damage.”

French intelligence services told a government crisis meeting on Thursday that the protest movement was initiated by politicians from the far-left La France Insoumise party, known as LFI, Reuters reported on Friday.

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Riot police officers face protesting students on Friday by blocking the entrance to the Le Corbusier high school in Aubervilliers, north of Paris. (Lou Benoist / AFP via Getty Images)

LFI denied the allegations and accused President Emmanuel Macron’s government of politicizing protests in the run-up to the 2027 French presidential election.

Simone Rodan-Benzaquen, senior Europe envoy at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Fox News Digital on Thursday that the unrest began with legitimate concerns but has since evolved into something much more serious.

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“Students’ grievances about disappearing teachers and deteriorating schools were real at the beginning,” Rodan-Benzaquen said. “But dousing a principal with gasoline and attacking firefighters are acts of extreme violence. What makes this politically significant is the attempt to turn frustration with schools into a much broader confrontation with the government.”

Fox News’ Efrat Lachter contributed to this report.