Deporting Dreamers only hurts the United States

Regarding the recent commentary, “Dreaming even bigger: Immigration reform now” (Sept. 6) by Elizabeth Keyes, there’s a fundamental moral dimension to DACA that arcs over the entire discussion: imperatives as to how people ought to treat other people with grace and humanity. Shelving that aspect momentarily, however, let’s look very briefly at the dimension that spotlights America’s no-nonsense self-interest — perhaps satisfying more appetites.

That is, the nuts and bolts of how it’s to the United States’ advantage to assign the hundreds of thousands of “dreamers” permanent legal status: contribution to GDP, pool of creativity, educated and trained workers, essential skill sets, taxpayers, entrepreneurship and youthful cohort to slow the population’s aging.

Dreamers are Americans, through and through, who contribute to the United States’ energy, growth, relevance and competitiveness. Congress must legislate the means to eventual citizenship for dreamers. That is the natural extension to both dimensions of the DACA debate: morality and (unsentimental) national self-interest.

Surely, America doesn’t really want to disadvantage itself by setting onerous conditions or, more direly, acting on the devastating threat of deportation. Congress needs to step in decisively.