Politics & Government
Trump Should Keep DACA To Prevent Deportations: Legal Scholars
Courts have ruled the president can use "prosecutorial discretion" to give immigrants temporary protective status, the scholars said.
ALBUQUERQUE, NM — Around 100 law professors and immigration attorneys are calling on President Donald Trump to keep in place a program that protects hundreds of thousands of young immigrants from deportation.
The group of legal scholars planned to send Trump an open letter Monday saying he could legally preserve an Obama-era program known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA.
Michael Olivas, a law professor at the University of Houston Law Center and Santa Fe, New Mexico, resident, told The Associated Press the letter details why the program is legal. (For more information on this and other neighborhood stories, subscribe to Patch to receive daily newsletters and breaking news alerts. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)
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"It's a very successful program, and we layout the legality," said Olivas, one of the authors of the letter. "It is not unconstitutional as some have suggested."
Federal courts have ruled the president can use "prosecutorial discretion" to give certain immigrants, like these young migrants, temporary protective status, the scholars said.
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The Trump administration has said it still has not decided the program's fate. It has helped around 750,000 immigrants.
A group of Republican attorneys general has called on the Trump administration to phase out the program. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and others have threatened to amend a district court case to challenge the DACA program unless the Trump administration acts to phase it out. Meanwhile, 20 Democratic attorneys general led by Xavier Becerra of California are asking Trump to keep the program.
Last month, then-Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly told Hispanic lawmakers that the program is likely illegal, though he personally supports it.
The program gives work permits to young people brought to the U.S. as children.
Trump pledged as a candidate to immediately end the program. But as president, he has said those immigrants will not be targets for deportation.
He said his administration is more interested in deporting criminals.
By RUSSELL CONTRERAS, Associated Press
Photo credit: Alan Diaz/Associated Press