New York Daily News

Pol pushes funds for Dreamers

- BY MARCO POGGIO and BEN CHAPMAN

THE DREAM lives on.

Queens State Sen. Jose Peralta joined activists at Flushing Meadows Corona Park on Friday to call on lawmakers to pass the DREAM Act giving financial aid to undocument­ed college students. The measure, which is short fors Developmen­t, Relief and Education for Alien Minors, was approved by the state Assembly on Feb. 5 and is now being considered by the Senate.

The measure allows students brought into the U.S. as children to seek state financial aid for higher education, including the state Tuition Assistance Program.

The Assembly has passed the legislatio­n in previous years but each year the Senate kills it. Peralta (D-Jackson Heights) said this year must be different.

“We need to pass the DREAM Act on the state level,” Peralta said at a press conference that drew a crowd of roughly a dozen demonstrat­ors to the park’s Unisphere.

He said “we’re in a different era now, referring to two state Senate seats that are the subject of special elections on April 24.

If won by Democrats, the party will then have the majority to pass the DREAM Act, Peralta said, if every Dem votes for it.

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