DREAM Act backers make economic case
While urging Congress to consider legislation to protect people brought illegally into the country as children, advocates in Ohio are upping the stakes with a $ 92 million twist.
If Congress passes such a bill, the state’s gross domestic product would see long- term increases of approximately $ 92 million a year and an increase in state and local tax revenue of $ 6 million a year, according to the Center for American Progress and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, respectively. If the act isn’t passed, the state could lose upwards of $ 5 million in tax revenue, according to the institute.
Immigration- reform group America’s Voice Ohio, based in Cleveland, released the information Thursday on a Policy Matters Ohio analysis of the economic impact of Ohio ‘ Dreamers’ and those enrolled in Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, a program that President Donald Trump canceled in September. Trump gave Congress six months to figure out what if anything to do on the issue.
The DREAM Act, introduced in the Senate on July 20, proposes canceling the impending removal from the country of those in the DACA program and others who came to the United States when they were younger than 18 and have lived in the country for more than four years. Instead, they would be offered legal permanentresident status, with some conditions.
“Passage of a DREAM Act really would allow immigrants here in Ohio and across the country to contribute more fully and openly” to the economy, said Daniel Ortiz, outreach coordinator at Policy Matters Ohio, during a call with reporters Thursday. “It’s good for our communities, it’s good for a strong economy, and it’s the right thing to do.”
Currently, 9,000 Ohioans eligible for DACA contribute $ 12 million a year in taxes, Ortiz said. The 2012 executive order by President Barack Obama allowed people who have been in the country since 2007 and were brought here before age 16 to work and go to school legally.
In September, 4,000 people in Ohio had DACA status. An additional 5,000 were eligible, but that number has decreased and continues to drop; the Migration Policy Institute said 13,000 Ohioans were eligible for DACA in 2016, but it eliminated 4,000 potentially eligible people from its count when the Trump administration ended the program.
The nation had 689,800 DACA participants as of September. The Migration Policy Institute estimates that 1.3 million meet the criteria, making the participation rate 52 percent. Ohio’s DACA participation rate is 45 percent.
Although some members of Congress have said they will address the issue next year, local DACA participant Elvis Saldias said that might be too little, too late.
“The process to attain this status is not instant. I can personally tell you I applied for DACA in 2012 ... Overall, it was about a five- or six- month process,” said Saldias, 25, who came to the United States from Bolivia with his mother when he was 9. “It’s a process that takes time. That’s why there’s urgency behind it.”
Starting March 6 and running through March 5, 2020, DACA participants will lose their work authorization and protection from deportation at a rate of 915 a day, according to the Migration Policy Institute.
Saldias is fearful that he will lose his job as a property claims adjuster at Nationwide Insurance if Congress doesn’t act fast. His status expires in summer 2018, and if he doesn’t have his paperwork to his employer before that, the company must, under federal law, fire him.
“I need Congress to pass a DREAM Act because I need to continue doing what I’m doing,” Saldias said. “I want to continue giving back to my community in any role I can in the future.”