Supreme Court Rules DACA Program Was Ended Illegally

WASHINGTON, DC — The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the Trump administration acted illegally when it ended the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which protects from deportation non-U.S. citizens who were brought to this country illegally as children.

The 5-4 vote is a stunning rebuke to President Donald Trump’s efforts to end legal protections for 650,000 young immigrants, the Associated Press reported.

For now, DACA recipients — or Dreamers — retain their protection from deportation and their authorization to work in the United States.

The justices rejected administration arguments that the 8-year-old program is illegal and that courts have no role to play in reviewing the decision to end DACA.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court that the administration did not pursue the end of the program properly.

“We do not decide whether DACA or its rescission are sound policies,“ Roberts wrote. “We address only whether the agency complied with the procedural requirement that it provide a reasoned explanation for its action. Here the agency failed to consider the conspicuous issues of whether to retain forbearance and what if anything to do about the hardship to DACA recipients.”

The court’s four conservative justices dissented. Justice Clarence Thomas, in a dissent joined by Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch, wrote that DACA was illegal from the moment it was created under the Obama administration in 2012.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in a separate dissent that he was satisfied that the administration acted appropriately in trying to end the program, AP reported.

Civil rights groups and elected lauded the court's decision.

Andrea Flores, deputy director of immigration policy for the American Civil Liberties Union, said it's time for Trump and White House Senior Advisor Stephen Miller to "end their crusade against Dreamers and immigrants."

"This decision allows DACA recipients to live and work without the daily fear of deportation, and confirms what we have always known: America is their home," Flores said in a news release.

In Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said Thursday she was "overcome with joy and relief" for Dreamers when asked about the decision at an unrelated news conference. Lightfoot also said she believes it will go down as one of the Supreme Court's most historic rulings.

"We must protect all of our immigrant and refugee communities, particularly young people," Lightfoot said. "This is important for our city and I really think it will give these young people a measure of comfort and support that they can live their true, authentic lives — in our city, and all across the country."

Trump, however, didn't hold back when expressing his assessment of the ruling.

“These horrible & politically charged decisions coming out of the Supreme Court are shotgun blasts into the face of people that are proud to call themselves Republicans or Conservatives. We need more Justices or we will lose our 2nd Amendment & everything else. Vote Trump 2020!" he wrote on Twitter.

In a second tweet, he wrote, “Do you get the impression that the Supreme Court doesn’t like me?"

The DACA program grew out of an impasse over a comprehensive immigration bill between Congress and the Obama administration in 2012. President Barack Obama decided to formally protect people from deportation while also allowing them to work legally in the U.S.

Trump, however, made immigration a central part of his campaign and less than eight months after taking office, announced in September 2017 that he would end DACA.

Immigrants, civil rights groups, universities and Democratic-led states quickly sued, and courts put the administration’s plan on hold.

The Department of Homeland Security has continued to process two-year DACA renewals so that hundreds of thousands of DACA recipients have protections stretching beyond the election and even into 2022, AP reported.