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Immigrant program in limbo; uncertain future for ‘dreamers’
Trump leans on giving Congress 6 months to find a fix, aides say
Lawmakers and advocates on both sides began to stake out positions for an extended public fight over whether Congress should provide legal status to young undocumented immigrants known as “dreamers” as President Trump prepares to rescind protections for them.
WASHINGTON — Lawmakers and advocates on both sides began to stake out positions Monday for an extended public fight over whether Congress should provide legal status to young people living in the U.S. without permission as President Donald Trump is preparing to rescind Obama-era DACA protections for them.
Moderate congressional Republicans, and some conservatives, suggested that they are open to crafting a legislative deal that could offer permanent legal status to hundreds of thousands of immigrants who have been in the country illegally since they were children. Democrats lambasted Trump for his expected decision and called on the GOP to join them to protect DACA beneficiaries.
Urgency on Capitol Hill has mounted amid reports that Trump will end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which has allowed nearly 800,000 people to live and work in the United States without fear of deportation.
Trump, who is scheduled to announce his decision Tuesday, is leaning toward terminating the program but delaying enforcement for six months to give lawmakers time to find a solution, according to people briefed on the White House’s deliberations.
Trump faces a Tuesday deadline from Texas and several other states that have vowed to sue the administration over DACA if the president does not terminate it.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions, an immigration hawk, has suggested that the Justice Department would not be able to defend the program’s constitutionality in court and has lobbied Trump to end it. Other top advisers, including Chief of Staff John Kelly, have pushed him to maintain the program until lawmakers act.
Yet the odds that a sharply polarized Congress could strike a deal — steep in the best of times — are considered especially difficult at a time when lawmakers face a busy fall agenda. Congress is under pressure to raise the federal debt limit, pass a spending bill and approve a defense authorization bill, at a time when Republicans also hope to consider a tax plan and potentially try once again to repeal the Affordable Care Act.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, RS.C., who has been involved in previous bipartisan immigration reform efforts, said he would support Trump’s plan to end DACA after a six-month delay. In a statement, Graham said the program amounted to “presidential overreach” by President Barack Obama, who created it by executive action in 2012.
But Graham added that he empathizes with the so-called Dreamers who “know no country other than America. If President Trump makes this decision, we will work to find a legislative solution to their dilemma.”
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said Trump is poised to “break the hearts and offend the morals of all who believe in justice and human dignity.”
Trump’s decision to include a six-month delay could be a bid to shift some of the political pressure and consequences over the DACA beneficiaries onto congressional Republicans. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and several other GOP leaders have urged Trump not to end the program and to let Congress pursue its own course of action.
The president and his senior advisers continued to deliberate Monday, and aides cautioned that Trump could still change his mind ahead of the announcement. Important details such as whether the administration would continue to accept DACA applications and issue renewals for twoyear work permits during the six-month delay remained unresolved.
It also remains unclear whether Texas and the other states would move forward with their lawsuit if Trump announces that he will end the program in six months.
A deal on the DACA beneficiaries has eluded Congress before — most recently in 2010, when the Dream Act, which would have offered the younger immigrants a path to citizenship, failed by five votes in the Senate after passing the House.
Ryan and other GOP leaders have not laid out a new legislative path, including whether the immigrants’ future would be addressed in isolation — which would appeal to Democrats and moderates — or be coupled with proposals to increase border security and tighten immigration controls, which could win greater support from conservatives.
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., an immigration hard-liner, suggested that he would be open to giving DACA beneficiaries legal permanent residence provided that any deal also include his legislative proposal, called the RAISE Act, which would slash legal immigration levels by half over a decade.
Trump offered public support for that bill during an appearance with Cotton and Sen. David Perdue, RGa., its co-sponsor, last month at the White House.
Others have suggested that Trump could attempt to use the issue to bargain for a down payment, an estimated $1.6 billion, on the U.S.-Mexico border wall he promised voters during the campaign. Senior lawmakers have shown no signs that they plan to support the wall in upcoming budget negotiations.