Canadian ‘Dreamers’ face possible deportation from U.S.
CANADIAN DREAMERS FACING POSSIBLE DEPORTATION FROM THE UNITED STATES ARE ‘JUST TRYING TO WORK’
From the stars- andstripes flag on her desk to the way she spells colour — without a “u,” of course — Leezia Dhalla says she couldn’t feel more American.
She’s lived 21 of her 27 years south of the border, after all, and in the red-meat heartland of Texas, no less.
Yet a contentious decision by President Donald Trump to c ancel t he s o- c al l ed Dreamers program for illegal immigrants who came to the states as children means Dhalla could soon be deported to a country she barely knows — Canada.
The heated debate around t he Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals ( DACA) policy has focused largely on Latin Americans, who make up most of the 800,000 people it affects. But Dhalla, who at age six moved with her parents from Edmonton to San Antonio, is among a surprising 750 Canadian citizens registered under DACA and now facing a hazy future.
Canadian Dreamers won’t be forced back to a developing country plagued by violent crime at least, but the prospect of uprooting lives forged in the U.S. is still chilling, Dhalla says.
“For me, 20 years is a lifetime … I don’t know anything else. I don’t know anything outside of the U.S.,” she says. "There’s a reason we are here and there’s a reason we have chosen to stay. I have a very deep sense of patriotism and it’s not just about putting a sign on my lawn on the Fourth of July.”
Former president Barack Obama implemented the DACA program in 2012 — as it happened, on the day Dhalla graduated from Chicago’s Northwestern University.
It meant people who had come to the U. S. when they were 15 or younger — by no choice of their own — and had been in the country at least since June 2007 were legally able to work, attend school and not be deported.
Polls suggest most Americans are sympathetic with their plight. But critics say DACA is tantamount to amnesty for law breakers and an unconstitutional circumvention of Congress by the last administration. With 10 states promising legal challenges against the policy, Trump a nnounced last month he was ending it.
He also set up a six-month phase- out period and suggested Congress bring in l egislation allowing t he Dreamers to stay.
The majority of DACA recipients are Mexican, with Canada 27 th among countries of origin, according to U. S. Citizenship and Immigration Services statistics.
There would certainly be no barrier to Canadian Dreamers returning to this country if necessary. Anyone born in Canada — other than the children of diplomats — automatically becomes a Canadian citizen, said an Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada spokesman.
Whether they want to return is another matter.
Jason Finkelman, an Austin, Texas- based immigration lawyer who has a handful of Canadian Dreamer clients, says most entered the U.S. on their parents’ work or study visas, then overstayed with their families and become undocumented.
Abandoning the country they consider home would be a “huge” dislocation, especially since many left when they were small children and have no close family or friends here, he said.
Short of Congress passing a law to replace DACA, however, they and other Dreamers now have few options, even with the strong support of the people they work for, said Finkelman.
“Every single one of my clients, whatever their nationalities, had their employer call me: ‘ We love Mr. or Mrs. X, we’re willing to continue to sponsor them … to do whatever we can to retain this employee.’”
Dhalla’s story began with a flat housing market in Edmonton, which convinced her realtor father to buy a business in Texas in the mid1990s, then obtain a visa that allowed the family to follow him south.
He r childhood wa s marked by regular visits to the immigration lawyer, but attempts to get permanent residency floundered, partly because of red- tape errors: an employer who filed papers late and another who sold his business before the Canadians’ application could be processed.
In her third year of college, Dhalla received a letter asking her to appear in immigration court — the first step toward deportation.
The DACA program — coming just as she finished her university journalism degree the next year — was “transformative.”
Dhalla says she found not just one, but two jobs, started a business writing resumes for others and bought a house and car.
She now works in Washington, D.C., for FWD.us, the immigration-reform organization founded by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg. She and two other Dreamers were even interviewed by Zuckerberg about the end of DACA in a Facebook Live video.
Contemplating possible deportation, she jokes about the more subtle differences between America and the country of her birth, from Canada’s “funny” accents to its lack of one-dollar bills.
“You don’ t even spell words properly in Canada,” Dhalla chides. “You all switch the ‘ r’ and the ‘e’ around in centre. I don’t know why. You have extra l’s and random u’s everywhere. It’s crazy.”
But she also wonders how she could pursue her dream of becoming a lawyer in Canada after an education founded in U. S. politics and law — and fears being separated from friends in the states.
While Finkelman says his clients would just as soon keep a low profile, Dhalla is defiant.
“Dreamers are pretty resilient people. We are smart, we are American and just by virtue of being American, we’re pretty tough,” she said. “( But) it feels like undocumented communities are being terrorized … To take all of that away from people, when they’re just trying to work, is absurd.”
... THERE’S A REASON WE HAVE CHOSEN TO STAY.