It’s been more than two years that the Department of Homeland Security appealed to the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) the preliminary injunction entered by the Northern District of California, which stopped the federal government from disbanding the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
Since then, 49 amici curiae briefs have been filed and a decision is expected by the end of June 2020.
DACA, created with an executive order signed by former President Obama, allows recipients to legally obtain a social security number, driver’s license, enroll in college and to work without fear of deportation.
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The Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence (CCJ) is among the organizations that submitted an amici curiae brief in support of petitioners, which include President Donald J. Trump, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the United States.
As the public interest law arm of the Claremont Institute in Orange County, CCJ’s position is that the Immigration and Nationality Act mandates removal of unauthorized aliens, including DACA recipients, and that legislation not an executive order must be passed to change current immigration law to allow entry.
“The claim that a President has the discretion not to commence removal proceedings against unauthorized aliens and thereby afford to them a 'lawful presence' in the United States cannot be squared with Congress’s language that a determination of admissibility by an immigration judge in a removal proceeding is the 'sole and exclusive' means for determining whether an alien may be admitted,” wrote CCJ attorneys in their August 2019 brief.
But for a DACA recipient to end up in front of an immigration judge, it means they are likely to undergo deportation proceedings, according to George Farag, an expert in U.S. immigrant and non-immigrant visa policy who served as a diplomat and consular officer at American embassies in Iraq and Lebanon.
“They want to avoid this scenario,” Farag told the Southern California Record. “As illegal immigrants, they should be deported under our immigration law. However, some lawmakers did not want to deport them because they lived in the U.S. since they were children and America is the only home they know.”
Some 30% or 198,000 of all DACA recipients live in the state making it home to the largest DACA population in the U.S., according to U.S. Citizen & Immigration Services data. Within the state, 20% live in Southern California.
But if SCOTUS rules that the Trump Administration can end the program, recipients will lose legal status as their DACA permits expire.
“As long as the DACA program is in existence, recipients can renew their permit but if the DACA program is allowed to continue by the U.S. Supreme Court, it will still not provide a pathway to citizenship for recipients,” said Farag. “They would only continue to have the temporary ability to live and work in the United States.”
Most recently, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to suspend green cards for two months in an effort to protect Americans from the competition of international workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It affects people applying for green cards through employment, family or other means, with some significant exceptions, according to media reports.
“The current climate is terrifying,” said Farag. “Many are afraid of losing their legal status under the DACA program. The vast majority can never become citizens under current laws but some DACA recipients may qualify for a green card by marrying an American citizen.”
Whether the U.S. Supreme Court rules in favor of DACA recipients or not, they will likely be a part of a larger immigration reform battle in the future.
“Fighting to keep DACA does not mean legislation is not being pursued,” Farag said. “There are lawmakers working to push legislation to offer illegal immigrants, including DACA recipients, a path to citizenship.”