DACA recipients worry

Although DHS officials indicated in a press call that they would not change their policies towards prioritizing criminals for deportation and would not actively pursue DACA recipients, Sarai Bravo told VOA in New York that she can’t help but worry.

“This is the only country and the only place that I know is home, I’m not planning on leaving. Unless I’m forced to. So I’m going to continue fighting, coming with the rest of the community and encouraging people to come out and fight, and that is my plan. Trying to stay here forever…,” she said.

Despite widespread, but not universal, U.S. sentiment favoring letting the young people affected by the Obama order remain the U.S., action by Congress is not certain.

Lawmakers for years have been unsuccessful in transforming U.S. immigration policies despite repeated legislative attempts. During Obama’s eight-year tenure in the White House, the Senate approved major policy changes only to see the legislation die in the House of Representatives.

A small protest against Trump’s action unfolded in front of the White House Tuesday morning in support of DACA and its recipients and demonstrations are also expected in other cities across the United States.

One immigrant activist, Gustavo Torres, with the protesters behind him, told the crowd: “This president lied to our community… he told us ‘I have a big hope for you dreamers.’ He’s a liar!”

However, Trump came into office with a promise to eliminate DACA, but at times seemed to ease up on that rhetoric; since his inauguration, however, the president has prioritized bolstering the country’s deportation system, calling for thousands more immigration and border agents to be hired.[xyz-ihs snippet=”Adsense-responsive”]”DACA is not legislation, it’s executive action and the president could rightfully abandon it altogether or piece by piece,” explains David Abraham, professor of immigration and citizenship law at the University of Miami School of Law.

The states of New York and Washington said if Trump does end DACA, they will challenge the decision in court.

“We should not and cannot sit on the sidelines and watch the lives of these young people ruined,” New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said in a statement. “We have both a legal and moral obligation to make sure that the laws are faithfully executed without discrimination or animus.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan and several other Republican lawmakers had urged the president not to cancel the program. Ryan says he believes Congress should come up with a way of protecting people now in the DACA program.

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi has asked Ryan to work with Democrats this week to find a legislative solution for Trump’s ending the program.

There are DACA supporters on both sides of the political aisle in the United States, but key members of Trump’s inner circle – including Sessions – and many Republican members of Congress are vocal opponents who have criticized the program’s creation as executive overreach on Obama’s part.

_{VOA News Center reporter Ramon Taylor contributed to this report from New York.}

Source: VOA