In today’s immigration news: Marking the 12th anniversary of DACA; stories from the southern border; more.
Tomorrow, June 15, is the 12th anniversary of DACA—Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. Back in 2012, DACA was the Obama administration’s stopgap measure to protect Dreamers.
Who were/who are the Dreamers? They are the undocumented children brought to the United States by their parents. Those who were very young when they came may have no memory of their home country. All of them grew up here, going to school here, considering this country their home.
At some point, reality bit. Maybe that was when she applied for a library card and was turned down because she could not produce a birth certificate. Maybe he wanted a driver’s license and his parents had to explain, painfully, that he was not a citizen, not a legal resident, could not get a driver’s license. Or a job. Or a college scholarship.
Americans, in 2012 and now, overwhelmingly favor creating a way for the Dreamers to become legal permanent residents and U.S. citizens. But Republicans in Congress then and now refuse to pass the needed legislation. Often, they say they support Dreamers, but then vote against the needed legislation.
In 2012, the Obama administration’s executive actions created the temporary protection called DACA. Dreamers who got DACA protection would not be deported (that’s the “Deferred Action” part of the protection) and could get work permits. They still did not have any path to permanent legal residence or citizenship–that requires Congressional action.
DACA protection was hard to get—you had to assemble a pile of documentation, fill out an application, and pay a $495 application fee. You had to show good moral character, education or military service, and meet a host of other requirements. You had to be a certain age and have entered the United States during a specified window of time. If you got DACA status, you had to renew that status, and pay the fee again every two years.
Back in 2012, DACA was supposed to be a temporary protection while Congress worked out a permanent solution. That never happened.
In 2017, the Trump administration tried to end DACA, which would make all of the DACA recipients deportable. Courts allowed an end to new DACA applications, but refused to allow revocation of status for those already given DACA status. Since then, legal attacks on DACA have continued. In October, 2022, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals decided the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program violates U.S. immigration law. That decision was immediately appealed to the Supreme Court, which has yet to issue a decision.
[Mother Jones] “The common-sense vision for a permanent solution for Dreamers has gone from a no-brainer to an afterthought. It used to be the case that legislative pushes for stricter border enforcement measures would not even merit consideration unless they were tied to relief for Dreamers (to say nothing of the millions of other long-time undocumented people often also included in proposals). Legislation could fail to pass, as it repeatedly did. But that signaling of support—even if in sentiment alone—made clear where Dreamers stood. Now, that tacit pact has been broken, and with little ceremony. …
“Adding to the disregard for Dreamers is the potential end of their life raft. DACA is more at-risk than ever, relegated to die a slow death in the courts, where its legality and very existence is being litigated.”
Marking the 12th anniversary of DACA, Yuna Oh spoke on the continuing precariousness of life in the United States for Dreamers:
[Zachary Mueller Substack] “I arrived from South Korea when I was just six years old and have lived in Maryland for over 22 years. This is my only home. My parents left everything behind to give me and my brother a better life than the one they left behind. They were and are still true believers in the American Dream.
“Although DACA has provided me with opportunities, such as being able to attend college and work with dignity, it has never been sufficient to ensure protection from the increasing risk of deportation.
“I’ve often heard the hurtful phrase ‘just go back to where you came from.’ However, the truth is that the United States is my home. America is all I have ever known and I am American in every way except on paper.
“I, along with my family and millions of other DACA recipients, should be able to feel safe in the place we call home, free from the ever present shadow that we are one policy away from being stripped from friends and loved ones. People like me are often dehumanized and scapegoated for all kinds of the nation’s problems, with our deportation to foreign lands falsely championed as the easy-fix-it-solution. But the mass deportation of those like me won’t fix the struggles that other hard working Americans face but likely only create more.”
And in other news
Advocacy groups sued to stop the Biden executive order cutting off asylum applications. The lawsuit was filed in the federal district court in Washington, charging that the executive order violates U.S. asylum law and sends migrants back to countries where they could be harmed or killed.
[Washington Post] “Biden administration officials say the rules allow for exemptions in extreme humanitarian cases such as if a migrant has a medical emergency or faces an imminent death threat in Mexico, which has agreed to accept thousands of noncitizens.
“To trigger that exception, however, the new rules require that migrants ‘manifest’ their fears by speaking up, shaking or crying. Border agents typically ask migrants if they are fleeing harm, but the new restrictions no longer allow that.
“Lawyers say the rule, called the “shout test,” is risky because migrants are often afraid to speak to armed border guards or are too traumatized to share their fears.”
President Biden’s executive order closes the border–officially–to most asylum seekers. But can an order really close the border?
[New York Times] “[T]here are plenty of ways for people to get into the country along the border — running from California to Texas — particularly without any new resources to help guard the frontier. …
“But the main problem for the White House is that Republicans have blocked billions in funding that would have helped enforce the order, raising questions about just how transformative it will be at a moment of massive migration around the world.”
Lack of resources delays some deportations. Others are stalled because of refusal to accept returns by the migrant’s country of origin.
[Associated Press] “The Border Patrol arrested Gerardo Henao 14 hours after President Joe Biden suspended asylum processing at the U.S. border with Mexico this week. But instead of being summarily deported, he was dropped off by agents the next day at a San Diego bus stop, where he caught a train to the airport for a flight to Newark, New Jersey.
“Henao, who said he left his jewelry business in Medellin, Colombia, because of constant extortion attempts, had one thing working in his favor: a scarcity of deportation flights to that country. Lack of resources, diplomatic limitations and logistical hurdles make it difficult for the Biden administration to impose its sweeping measure on a large scale. …
“Border officials were told to give the highest priority to detaining migrants who can be easily deported, followed by “hard to remove” nationalities requiring at least five days to issue travel documents and then “very hard to remove” nationalities whose governments don’t accept U.S. flights.”
As border crossing becomes more difficult, migrants seek more remote crossing places. That means the risk of trying to cross increases.
[The Guardian] “Experts and human rights advocates in El Paso are concerned that the unintended consequences of Biden’s executive action may be to worsen the risks for asylum seekers, while not deterring them from taking those risks as they flee violence, war, dictatorship, the climate crisis, and the dangers and poverty those bring. …
“Usually, when law enforcement find bodies, those people hadn’t even made it two miles into the US on foot before collapsing.
“Two days after Biden’s immigration speech, 11 people were hospitalized and seven smuggling suspects were arrested near San Antonio, Texas, after authorities found more than two dozen migrants who had been driven from the border packed in a secret compartment of a trailer with little water in the sweltering heat, the Associated Press reported.”
Immigration news 