Posted on 09/03/2017 6:32:49 AM PDT by Kaslin
WASHINGTON -- No issue has torn President Donald J. Trump as much DACA -- that is the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program enacted by the Obama administration in June 2012 to provide temporary legal status to undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as children. The White House has said that it will issue a decision on DACA's future Tuesday.
As a candidate, Trump had promised his supporters that if elected, he would eliminate DACA on "day one." But after he came into office, the new president could not pull the trigger.
"But the DACA situation is a very, very -- it's a very difficult thing for me," Trump confessed to reporters in February. "Because, you know, I love these kids. I love kids. I have kids and grandkids. And I find it very, very hard doing what the law says exactly to do."
Trump promised to "deal with DACA with heart."
While candidate Trump pushed for tough enforcement of federal immigration law, President Trump clearly was moved by the same sentiments that prompted Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, to argue against rescinding a program that has allowed some 750,000 undocumented immigrants to remain in the country legally and apply for work permits.
"Like the president, I've long advocated for tougher enforcement of our existing immigration laws," Hatch said in a statement. "But we also need a workable, permanent solution for individuals who entered our country unlawfully as children through no fault of their own and who have built their lives here."
"These young people are known as Dreamers," 43 Democratic Senators, including Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, wrote in a July 27 letter to Trump. "They came to the United States as children and are American in every way except for their immigration status. We have already invested in them by educating them in American schools. It makes no sense to squander their talents by deporting them to countries they barely remember."
The calendar and a group of pro-enforcement state attorneys general apparently have prodded Trump to make up his mind, rather than allow the program to continue indefinitely.
In 2014 the attorneys general sued to stop the expansion of DACA and another Obama mandate -- Deferred Action for American Parents, which provided legal status for 5 million undocumented immigrants who are related to DACA recipients. The attorneys general prevailed in federal courts and a 4-4 U.S. Supreme Court decision upheld their complaint.
In June the leader for the anti-DAPA attorneys general, Ken Paxton of Texas, wrote a letter that informed U.S. Attorney General Jess Sessions his group would sue to end DACA if the administration did not rescind DACA by Sept. 5, 2017.
"This September 5 deadline is a political deadline, not a legal deadline," protested Marielena Hincapie, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, in a statement. "It was completely manufactured by Texas Attorney General Paxton and other extremists within the White House and the Department of Justice, simply to box President Trump into a corner."
With Neil Gorsuch on the U.S. Supreme Court, Paxton and company are likely to succeed.
Even though he later signed an executive order, Obama understood that unilateral action was highly vulnerable to a legal challenge. In 2010 he was asked why he had not passed legislation to legalize undocumented immigrants. Obama responded, "I am president. I am not king. I can't do these things just by myself. We have a system of government that requires the Congress to work with the executive branch to make it happen."
After Obama signed DACA, he maintained that it was legal because it allowed the feds to exercise prosecutorial discretion by not pursuing undocumented immigrants who came here as children.
Federal Judge Andrew S. Hanen of Brownsville, Texas, however, overturned DACA because, he wrote, "Exercising prosecutorial discretion and/or refusing to enforce a statute does not also entail bestowing benefits" -- such as work permits.
In December 2010 congressional Democrats tried to pass the DREAM Act, which would have enacted a path to citizenship for some undocumented immigrants, but the measure garnered 55 votes -- five short of the 60 votes needed to bring it to a floor vote. At the time there were 56 Democrats in the Senate and two independents who caucused with Democrats who voted for the measure. Four Democrats opposed the DREAM Act. Two Republicans supported it. Three Republicans and one Democrat did not cast a vote.
One door closed, another opened. In 2012, Obama authorized DACA, which mimicked provisions of the DREAM Act, unilaterally -- a method that by its very nature left the door open for a successor to end the program unilaterally.
If Trump rescinds DACA, those who applied for temporary legal status likely would feel more vulnerable because they registered with the federal government, say advocates for undocumented immigrants. These organizations have been joined by leaders in tech and big business.
Mark Krikorian of the pro-enforcement Center for Immigration Studies noted that the DREAM Act offered protections for "genuinely sympathetic cases of people who came as infants and toddlers." But, he added, "the DREAM Act itself was never intended to pass on its own -- it was a marketing gimmick to make the case for amnestying all 12 million illegals."
Since Trump first failed to rescind DACA, the smart money has been on Trump reaching across the aisle and passing a measure that protects so-called Dreamers -- who did not choose to come to the country illegally -- but also bolsters enforcement, perhaps by funding the wall.
On Friday House Speaker Paul Ryan told local radio station WCLO he did not think Trump should rescind DACA, as "this is something that Congress has to fix." A "heartened" House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi invited Ryan to meet with Democrats to discuss the issue.
But when McClatchy News reported last week that the Trump White House was considering a compromise bill that included Dreamer protections and more law enforcement, Pelosi was incensed. As if to bolster Krikorian's point, she tweeted, "It is reprehensible to treat children as bargaining chips. America's DREAMers are not negotiable. "
I agree. There is nothing to be conflicted about. President Trump made a promise, and if he breaks this one, he will lose his base and I won’t be able to trust him.
If they came here illegally,
Throw their asses out.
Get in line.
Come here legally or get out.
Mr. Trump, during your rally in WPB, you said they need to go.
Now is NOT the time to wussie out.
Stand up for America. Make America great again.
We are NOT the world, we are America,
See you can't reason or compromise with the Left folks. The minute Trump caves on DACA, suits will be filed to allow the stupid Dreamers citizenship and bring in their relatives.
END DACA. Ryan had 3 years to pass something legislatively if he wanted it. Let Congress deal with it.
Invite them into your home then. I want all illegals out of the country. I don’t give a damn how nice they are or if they’re cute little babies.
Trump needs to play real hardball on this. 700,000 dreamers for the border wall funds.
How do you deport someone "with heart"?
Sorry, Mr. President, but the law is clear. They have to go and go as soon as possible. And if that means you have to harden your heart then unfortunately that comes with your job.
Negotiating what?
Nancy Pelosi talks about bargaining chips when it was Obama who, for democrat political purposes, used DACA to bypass US legal immigration. President Trump is cleaning up yet another time bomb left by Obama. I support however he resolves this. I do not know all that is involved in making a decision but Pres Trump should know that appeasement of the opposition at the expense of what is good for the American public will not buy him anything at all from them. It will then be, it’s about time or some other snark.
Their parents are at fault, we have to stop making this an incentive or the rest of the world be expect it as well.
Also this person has benefitted from 18 years of public services. They should be glad we’re not handing them a bill for that when they leave.
https://ballotpedia.org/2016_presidential_candidates_on_DACA_and_DAPA
“temporary legal status”?? It looks like they’re dug in like ticks, if the president doesn’t enforce the law.
Candidate Trump, 2016:
“The election, and the Supreme Court appointments that come with it will decide whether or not we have a border and, hence, a country. Clinton has pledged to expand Obama’s executive amnesty, hurting poor African-American and Hispanic workers by giving away their jobs and federal resources to illegal immigrant labor – while making us all less safe. It is time to protect our country and Make America Safe Again and Great Again for everyone.”[17]
“In August 2015, Trump said that he would rescind President Obama’s Immigration Accountability Executive Actions, which proposed extending DACA and creating DAPA. During an interview with Chuck Todd, host of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Trump said, “We have to make a whole new set of standards. And when people come in, they have to come in...” Todd then interrupted Trump, asking, “You’re going to split up families. You’re going to deport children.” Trump replied, “Chuck — no, no. No, we’re going to keep the families together. We have to keep the families together.” Todd then asked, “But you’re going to kick them out?” Trump replied, “They have to go.” Todd then asked, “What if they have no place to go?” Trump said, “We will work with them. They have to go. Chuck, we either have a country or we don’t have a country. Either we have a country or not.”[18]
President Trump, 2017
“And I find it very, very hard doing what the law says exactly to do.”
Why?
From the CATO report and other thread : http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3579684/post
Trump is a business man....and a "no decision" is always an option.
That’s President Trump to you. Got it?
Sounds like somebody needs a session in the high colonics clinic. :-)
Yesterday.
Part of the distinction with this group is that the “dreamers” didn’t come here. They were brought here by their parent(s). It’s wasn’t their decision to violate our law. It wasn’t their volition that made it happen.
But it really doesn’t matter. They are here illegally and the law makes no provision for them to be here. So they have to go back.
President Trump may be personally conflicted on this issue but I would hope he possesses sufficient duty, honor and courage to keep his promise and enforce the law.
It’s the federal government that is at fault actually for not keeping the illegal family out in the first place. Reagan started the mess with amnesty and now trump has to somehow fix 40 years of a mess.
Interesting but liberals never say this to blacks...We are not responsible for what whites did to blacks 150 years ago..We had no say in those decisions..We aren’t whipping you and you aren’t picking cotton...Liberals always use the “ they had no say in the decision” only when it helps their narrative..
Yes, wall funding PLUS the Raise Act.
“Immigrants” How many times here over the last decade have we seen the MSM lie with this word?
To hear the gnashing of teeth from the left, you might think having to return to Mexico is a prison sentence.
And all the freepers saying, “Let’s negotiate! We give you this, say DACA, you give us the wall ... “
There’s nothing to negotiate. No more illegals squatting. Build the wall. Mexico gets the bill. We hashed all of this out November 8th.
If the Beast had won, the Hillary artillery would be going off every day. Before too long the country would be lost, overrun by `legals’ and lying `refugees’ all yearning to live free.
So now, if we start with the: “Well, little Juan (43 years old) has fibromyalgia and can’t get treatment (or SSI) in Juarez ... “ that would be chumming the water for the lawyers: the exceptions would eat the rule. Then every illegal in Pocatello is an exception.
Juan has “anchor children”? Too bad. It’s tough on bank robbers’ kids when they get canned. They came here and broke our laws. They take our jobs but don’t pay payroll taxes, they avail themselves of welfare benefits, kill us on the roads, and on-and-on, but unless they are felons they aren’t going to prison.
Suck it up buttercups—aliens and resident wheeler-dealers. You knew this was coming for 9 months.
If they deport themselves maybe they can come back. But they will get in line this time, like real immigrants.
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