Thread: Under Trump, Conservatives Put Less Urgency On Ending DACA

03/01/2017


Under Trump, Conservatives Put Less Urgency On Ending DACA


But some are getting impatient as he fails to fulfill a top campaign promise.


Elise Foley


WASHINGTON ― President Donald Trump is mostly getting a pass from his fellow Republicans and immigration hardliners for doing the very thing they castigated his predecessor for: giving undocumented young people work permits.


But beneath that silence there’s a divide among conservatives. Some are fine with Trump biding his time, even if it means he’s breaking a campaign promise that he’d end President Barack Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which grants temporary work authorization and deportation reprieve to young undocumented immigrants who came to the U.S. as children.


Others, including Trump’s allies, are losing patience.


“When a president takes an oath to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, that means he needs to enforce the laws. He doesn’t get to choose which laws will be enforced,” Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) told The Huffington Post. “That’s the problem we had with Obama, and we have this problem five weeks into the Trump presidency right now.”


Trump’s vow to end DACA has become a classic case of campaign promises meeting governing reality. It was easy for the president to say on the campaign trail that he would “immediately” end DACA and its protections for more than 750,000 undocumented young people. It was easy for Republicans to vote to dismantle it under Obama, who blocked all of their efforts.



But Trump is apparently finding it harder to follow through now that he’s in office. And now, with the GOP in power and owning the matter, Republicans have suddenly become more appreciative of the slow pace at which government often works.


Instead of calling for the immediate end of DACA, which affects young undocumented immigrants known as Dreamers, Trump now says he wants to “work something out.” He reportedly told journalists on Tuesday that he was open to granting Dreamers legal status. During aggressive deportation raids targeting undocumented immigrants ― including those who have committed petty crimes ― the Trump administration has let DACA recipients largely go free.


More importantly, the Department of Homeland Security is still granting and renewing DACA authorization. In other words, it’s not just looking the other way ― it’s actively giving Dreamers the benefits Trump said were unconstitutionally granted.


The whiplash has left Trump’s longtime defenders contemplating whether there is some larger objective the president hasn’t revealed yet.


“Is it one of those things that is irredeemable? No, maybe he’s got something up his sleeve that will kind of work it out,” said Roy Beck, president of the immigration reduction group NumbersUSA, who nonetheless conceded that the president had reneged on a main campaign promise. “But if giving out work permits and renewals was unconstitutional while Obama was doing it, then it’s unconstitutional while his administration is doing it.”



Federation for American Immigration Reform spokesman Ira Mehlman said he doesn’t think Trump is breaking a campaign promise “just yet.” But he said FAIR, which also advocates lower immigration levels, is hoping Trump will propose something “sooner rather than later.”


“I don’t think we’ve reached the point of impatience yet, but we’re certainly expecting that he will come to some kind of decision,” Mehlman said. “Our view was that DACA was unconstitutional to begin with, and there’s no really good reason to perpetuate it.”



So far, Republicans are giving Trump space with respect to his approach to DACA. It’s a benefit of the doubt they didn’t extend to others. Paul Nehlen, who challenged House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) last election as soft on immigration, said it would “absolutely be a disappointment” if Trump didn’t end DACA. But he isn’t calling him to task just yet.


“I’m not going to say ‘72 days in and he’s got to have this thing,’” Nehlen said in an interview at last week’s Conservative Political Action Conference. “If we get a year in, a year and a half in and DACA hasn’t done it, I’m going to be screaming from the mountaintops ‘We’ve gotta get this thing done.’”


Other longtime opponents of DACA were even less critical of Trump’s current lack of action. Rep. Dave Brat (R-Va.), who defeated former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) in part by painting him as “pro-amnesty” for undocumented immigrants, said Trump seems to be going down his list on immigration orders. He didn’t seem concerned that the president hasn’t gotten to DACA yet.


“He just got [Attorney General Jeff] Sessions in two weeks ago, so they’re going after the ‘rough hombres’ or whatever he calls them,” Brat said. “It was a promise, and I’ve heard they’ve got a list of their promises, so we’ll see what they do.”


To that point, Trump has hardly been a major disappointment for hard-line anti-immigration advocates. His administration called for more immigration agents and gave them broader latitude to detain people by eliminating Obama-era policies to let some undocumented immigrants go while pursuing others. The Trump administration has even detained some DACA recipients.


For those actions, Trump appears to have been granted latitude on DACA ― a far trickier element of immigration law with far more delicate political ramifications. Conservative talk radio, for example, has been notably kind to Trump on the matter, even after spending years fomenting much of the anti-immigration reform sentiment that animated the Republican Party. Talk show host Rush Limbaugh went so far as to say last week that he was open to some type of relief for Dreamers, as long as Trump deports others, increases border measures and excludes adult criminals and potential criminals from the same type of “amnesty.”


“A lot of people think that Trump’s caving, because if you allow the Dreamers to stay, we’re talking 750,000 Dreamers, kids, who each have two parents who could come in,” Limbaugh said. “Look, this is a no-win. Nobody’s going to win anything by deporting a bunch of kids that we let in ― whoever did, Obama, whatever. ... We’ll have to see how it all manifests itself. Look, there’s a caveat here: In order for the Dreamer thing to be acceptable, the rest of this stuff has to be by the book.”



The White House did not respond to a request for comment on Tuesday about why Trump hasn’t eliminated DACA yet.


To DACA critic Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies, it seems like the administration is in a “fetal crouch, hoping that the issue goes away.”


“The fact that they’re doing nothing on DACA ― they’re not even stopping new grants ― suggests to me that there’s differing opinions in the White House and absolutely no idea of how to proceed,” Krikorian said. “I had a grad school adviser who used the football analogy ‘When in doubt, fall on the ball.’ That seems to be what they’re doing.”



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/...b0780bac2c585f

“When a president takes an oath to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, that means he needs to enforce the laws. He doesn’t get to choose which laws will be enforced,” Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) told The Huffington Post. “That’s the problem we had with Obama, and we have this problem five weeks into the Trump presidency right now.”

Those are exactly my thoughts too! President Trump said it was unconstitutional during his campaign, so why is he continuing something he deems unconstitutional? Just doesn't make any sense.

Keep your promise, Mr. President, end DACA now!

What people are missing is that the court, Judge Hanen specifically, upheld by 5th Circuit Court of Appeals and then tied by US Supreme Court that let 5th Circuit ruling stand is that the Judge ruled the DACA 2012 program, the one everyone is claiming is unconstitutional, constitutional for now and to remain in place. That is the existing standing of the DACA 2012 program according to the courts.

That doesn't mean Trump can't end it. He can, but not because it's unconstitutional, simply because he doesn't like it or think it's in our national interest. He can let it expire, also, by failing to renew it and declaring it expired in March or June or whenever the actual start date was. He can stop taking on new applications. He can stop handing out work permits. There are a variety of options. He needs to pick one or a combination and run with it to end its continuation and then let the work permits that have been issued expire.

He could also take the tact that he disagrees with the court and believes the DACA 2012 due to the numbers which are much larger than originally represented by Obama have far exceeded the levels of prosecutorial discretion under the law at this point.

He may also want to have as many of them register and declare themselves as possible so the information can be used to locate them and deport them for crimes, violations, fraud, welfare usage, drug running, and so much more, including hunting down their parents who brought them here as well as associates and siblings who didn't qualify.

He's got a plan. But rightfully, he's not going to tell US everything because then the very people he wants to deport know what he's doing and he doesn't want that. He likes the "element of surprise".

That's not to say that as activists we shouldn't assume the worst and keep the pressure on him and Congress and Governors and Mayors and State and Local Law Enforcement, every minute of every hour of every day until every illegal alien and all their minor children are out of the United States.

Originally Posted by Judy

What people are missing is that the court, Judge Hanen specifically, upheld by 5th Circuit Court of Appeals and then tied by US Supreme Court that let 5th Circuit ruling stand is that the Judge ruled the DACA 2012 program, the one everyone is claiming is unconstitutional, constitutional for now and to remain in place. That is the existing standing of the DACA 2012 program according to the courts.

That doesn't mean Trump can't end it. He can, but not because it's unconstitutional, simply because he doesn't like it or think it's in our national interest. He can let it expire, also, by failing to renew it and declaring it expired in March or June or whenever the actual start date was. He can stop taking on new applications. He can stop handing out work permits. There are a variety of options. He needs to pick one or a combination and run with it to end its continuation and then let the work permits that have been issued expire.

He could also take the tact that he disagrees with the court and believes the DACA 2012 due to the numbers which are much larger than originally represented by Obama have far exceeded the levels of prosecutorial discretion under the law at this point.

He may also want to have as many of them register and declare themselves as possible so the information can be used to locate them and deport them for crimes, violations, fraud, welfare usage, drug running, and so much more, including hunting down their parents who brought them here as well as associates and siblings who didn't qualify.

He's got a plan. But rightfully, he's not going to tell US everything because then the very people he wants to deport know what he's doing and he doesn't want that. He likes the "element of surprise".

That's not to say that as activists we shouldn't assume the worst and keep the pressure on him and Congress and Governors and Mayors and State and Local Law Enforcement, every minute of every hour of every day until every illegal alien and all their minor children are out of the United States.

In my opinion, it's just silly to continue making excuses for President Trump on the DACA issue.

Please link the information you have from any court that specifically ruled that DACA 2012 is constitutional. To my knowledge there has never been a ruling on the constitutionality of the original DACA.

Excerpt:

A three-judge panel of the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals unanimously ruled that several immigration agents and the state of Mississippi lacked legal standing to sue over Obama’s 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program because evidence that the agents or the state would be harmed by the effort was too speculative.

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/0...s-court-116738

The constitutionality of the program was not ruled on by the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. The case was dismissed due to lack of standing.

Interestingly though, this did happen:

Excerpt:

In a July 31 ruling, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas dismissed a challenge to DACA brought by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, claiming that the "Court does not have jurisdiction over Plaintiffs' disputes." The ruling was issued in a case determining whether the Court had jurisdiction to rule on the challenge brought by the ICE agents.
While the Court determined that it did not have authority to hear the case, Judge Reed O'Connoragreed that program is likely unconstitutional. "[T]he Court finds that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their claim challenging the Directive and Morton Memorandum as contrary to the provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act," Judge O'Connor wrote. Under DACA, illegal aliens who meet certain criteria are administratively granted relief from deportation and permitted to work in the U.S.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/court-rules-daca-is-likely-unconstitutional-218012601.html

Keep your promise, Mr. President, end DACA now!

See page 5 of the Judge Hanen ruling in the link below for the ruling on the DACA 2012. I can't copy it for some reason, maybe someone else knows how to make it copy and paste. If so, please help and thank you very much.

https://www.documentcloud.org/docume...n-opinion.html

Under Trump, Conservatives Put Less Urgency On Ending DACA

Originally Posted by Judy

See page 5 of the Judge Hanen ruling in the link below for the ruling on the DACA 2012. I can't copy it for some reason, maybe someone else knows how to make it copy and paste. If so, please help and thank you very much.

https://www.documentcloud.org/docume...n-opinion.html

I read the information you provided. There is nothing on page 5 that rules on the constitutionality of DACA 2012. All it says is the complaint in this case does not involved DACA 2012. "Therefore, those actions are not before the Court and will not be addressed in this opinion."

It says quite abit more than that, but until I find a text that I can copy and paste, people will have to click on the link, go to page 5 and read the section highlighted in yellow to read the whole writing of the court on DACA 2012 which he left in place and continuing, when he could have done otherwise.

Trump, Kelly and/or Sessions, should end it on the earliest possible date by whatever legal avenue is available. And hopefully one or all of them will do so, very soon. Sean Spicer for some reason believes DACA 2012 expires in June, which would be 3 years from the date of Obama's 3 year renewal of DACA 2012 that was actually a Memo Directive issued by Jeh Johnson.

If Judge Hanen thought that DACA 2012 was unconstitutional, he would have included it in the case to be argued on the merits and put an injunction against future renewals and new applications, but he didn't.

There is a law in Congress that gives the Executive Branch, "prosecutorial discretion" based on "prioritization for best utilization of resources". This is the law that probably protects DACA 2012 until more resources are available or a better prosecution plan is implemented, more agents, more judges, more etc. Another possibility is that at the time of the ruling, the Judge cites 700,000 people eligible for this "deferred action", but now there are over 870,000 signed up. The scope has changed dramatically having grown by over 25% in less than 3 years, which would seem to me to be the best argument for ending new sign ups and renewals and prosecuting the problem.

This all may seem "silly" to you, but navigating through the law properly to ensure an action does not result in lawsuits that cost US taxpayers potentially billions of dollars in claims in addition to establishing new court precedents that weaken the powers of the Executive Branch to actually enforce our immigration laws, is not "silly". It's actually very serious.

Originally Posted by Judy

Iit says quite abit more than that, but until I find a text that I can copy and paste, people will have to click on the link, go to page 5 and read the section highlighted in yellow to read the whole writing of the court on DACA 2012 which he left in place and continuing, when he could have done otherwise.

Trump, Kelly and/or Sessions, should end it on the earliest possible date by whatever legal avenue is available. And hopefully one or all of them will do so, very soon. Sean Spicer for some reason believes DACA 2012 expires in June, which would be 3 years from the date of Obama's 3 year renewal of DACA 2012 that was actually a Memo Directive issued by Jeh Johnson.

If Judge Hanen thought that DACA 2012 was unconstitutional, he would have included it in the case to be argued on the merits and put an injunction against future renewals and new applications, but he didn't.

There is a law in Congress that gives the Executive Branch, "prosecutorial discretion" based on "prioritization for best utilization of resources". This is the law that probably protects DACA 2012 until more resources are available or a better prosecution plan is implemented, more agents, more judges, more etc. Another possibility is that at the time of the ruling, the Judge cites 700,000 people eligible for this "deferred action", but now there are over 870,000 signed up. The scope has changed dramatically having grown by over 25% in less than 3 years, which would seem to me to be the best argument for ending new sign ups and renewals and prosecuting the problem.

This all may seem "silly" to you, but navigating through the law properly to ensure an action does not result in lawsuits that cost US taxpayers potentially billions of dollars in claims in addition to establishing new court precedents that weaken the powers of the Executive Branch to actually enforce our immigration laws, is not "silly". It's actually very serious.

I read it and it clearly states, referring to DACA 2012:

. "Therefore, those actions are not before the Court and will not be addressed in this opinion."

How can you not see that?

What makes you think I can't see it? The difference between you and me is I understand what it means, and you obviously don't.