‘Dreamers’ seek clarity as a key deadline hits
Joseline Gonzalez’s life has been consumed by DACA since President Trump last month announced he was phasing out the program that staved off potential deportation for immigrants who entered the U.S. long ago as children.
As a critical Thursday deadline approached for some of the program’s recipients to file for a final two-year extension, and as Congress showed few signs of stepping in with a remedy, Gonzales was anxious — and busy.
The 23-year-old UC Berkeley graduate is not only one of nearly 700,000 immigrants aided by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which former President Barack Obama created in 2012, but she also
works as an outreach coordinator at Catholic Charities of the East Bay.
She’s been swamped answering last-minute questions, holding forums and helping those looking to renew their DACA protections one last time before Thursday, when renewal applications must be received by immigration officials. These renewals are for people whose status had been set to expire before March 5.
The scramble has been intense in some places. In San Francisco, officials said, city workers helped 70 people complete renewal applications and paid for their fees.
It has also been frustrating at times, Gonzalez said. While she has been able to help many people, she has also had to deliver bad news to some would-be applicants — that they don’t qualify for a DACA renewal for one reason or another.
“It’s straining but I feel that I bring hope to other individuals. I feel that I could be that resource for them,” she said.
At the same time, Gonzalez, who has dreams of becoming an attorney, is keeping one eye on the contentious and often enigmatic negotiations under way between Democrats and Republicans in Washington, D.C., over the prospect of future protections.
When Trump announced Sept. 5 that his administration was winding down the program, he also said he wanted Congress to come up with a solution for immigrants who have come to be known as “Dreamers.” That discussion, however, has been complicated by debates over concessions sought by Republicans on immigration enforcement and additional border security.
“I feel like this is just going to be going on for a long time,” Gonzalez said. “I’m trying to stay positive, but it’s really hard to tell.”
Unless Congress takes action, the phaseout of DACA will take a few years, because recipients will remain protected through their current twoyear terms. But beginning March 6, tens of thousands of recipients will begin to see their work permits expire, and could be deported.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-San Francisco, and her Senate counterpart, Chuck Schumer of New York, said in September they had agreed to a deal with Trump on a measure to help protect Dreamers while increasing border security — without a wall.
Polls over the past month have indicated wide support for permanent protections. But the discussions now appear muddled after reports this week that Trump told Republicans that no such deal was made.
“Well, Mr. Schumer last night said on a show, ‘If the president is walking away from it, he should tell us.’ But I believe the president will commit to it,” Pelosi said at a news conference with Schumer on Wednesday. “You know why? Because the American people are there. They believe in the Dreamers.”
Pelosi and Schumer said the president backed the latest version of the DREAM Act, which has sought to provide a path to citizenship for more than a million people.
“What we haven’t finished is the work on the security aspects of it, but on the DREAM Act the president is committed,” Pelosi said.
At a Senate hearing on DACA Tuesday, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat, called on Congress to back the DREAM Act.
“These youth should not be political footballs, they shouldn’t be asked to choose between their future and their families, and they should have the certainty of permanent immigration status,” she said.
Republicans have proposed their own initiatives, which could limit the protections and restrict when Dreamers are able to sponsor relatives who want to move to the U.S.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, RIowa, called for additional border security measures to be included in any potential deal, along with a mandate for employers to use a stringent system to verify the immigration status of workers.
“It would be a dereliction of our duty if we fail to take steps to end at least some of the illegal immigration as we know it, and kick the can down the road so that a future Congress has to address this very same problem again in another 15 years,” Grassley said Tuesday. “I’m confident that if everyone is reasonable, we can find a solution.”
Karthick Ramakrishnan, a professor of public policy at UC Riverside, said that while public support for protections for Dreamers has been constant, a key factor in the fight is how Republicans in the House who face primaries next year approach the deal.
Attempts by either side to strap other items into a deal, such as the border wall or more comprehensive immigration reform, will make passage of the DREAM Act less likely, he said. Nonetheless, he said, both Democrats and Republicans are under pressure to act, with some immigrants now set to lose protections in five months.
“Trump’s actions might have actually strengthened the DREAM Act,” he said. “He’s created a sense of urgency. Will Congress come through? If it doesn’t, what is Trump going to do? It has the potential for creating all sorts of conflict and drama in the spring, and most elected officials would be wise to avoid that.”