Thread: DACA WAIVER ATTRACTS FEWER THAN EXPECTED

WAIVER ATTRACTS FEWER THAN EXPECTED

Program grants two-year reprieve from deportation for eligible younger applicants

By Elizabeth Aguilera12:01 a.m.April 15, 2013Updated8:35 p.m.April 14, 2013

A controversial program that gives young unauthorized immigrants a temporary waiver from deportation has attracted far fewer people than was initially projected after its launch last summer.

The factors may be President Barack Obama’s re-election, a $465 application fee and the prospect of large-scale immigration reform this year, immigration experts said.

In addition, a considerable number of people meet all of the program’s requirements except for not yet being 15 — the minimum age to apply. And some have not satisfied the education standard because they are not currently enrolled in school or lack a high school diploma or General Educational Development certification.

The result: As of March 14, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program had received 469,530 applications since it began in mid-August. That compares with the Migration Policy Institute’s estimate of 1.7 million unauthorized immigrants who would be eligible immediately or eventually.

Applications to the program peaked in October — with more than 113,000 submitted — and have fallen to less than a third of that count in recent months, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. As of mid-March, the agency had approved 245,493 cases and rejected 15,941.

Locally, Daniel Alfaro has noticed a clear drop-off in the number of youths attending workshops about the program that are hosted by Alliance San Diego. Nearly 9,000 people have attended seven information forums, 11 assessment forums and eight application workshops led by the affiliated Dreamer Assistance Network since last summer.

“I think the main reason for the slowdown is a combination of the applicant, families not having the money to cover the cost to apply and the belief that immigration reform is just around the corner,” said Alfaro, who oversees Deferred Action outreach for Alliance San Diego. “I try to explain to them the benefits of applying for (the program) and encourage them to apply now and not wait for immigration reform, which may or may not benefit them and may or may not come into effect until next year.”

Local attorneys who have been helping unauthorized immigrants with the Deferred Action application process, either directly with clients or by volunteering through nonprofit community workshops, said the slump began after the November presidential election. They said before Obama won a second term, people were rushing to lock in Deferred Action’s two-year deportation exemption — with potential renewal — because they feared that Republican nominee Mitt Romney would discontinue the program.

Deferred Action status also grants a work permit and the chance to obtain a driver’s license if the applicant is from California.

“When this came out, everyone was a little afraid or uncertain. Then there was a big push to get people educated and let them know this is a safe thing to do if you were qualified,” said Anna Hysell, an immigration attorney who runs the North County Immigration law firm in Cardiff. “It’s not cheap. Sometimes people have limited means, so they might be holding off waiting to see if immigration reform will pass. ... The danger is that there is no guarantee of reform, and they don’t have protection in the meantime.”

A request to interview officials at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services about Deferred Action was referred to the Department of Homeland Security, which did not respond to phone calls and emails seeking comment.

Of the projected 1.7 million unauthorized immigrants who would qualify for the program, the Migration Policy Institute estimated that about a third of them have not reached the minimum age to apply.

An additional 350,000 are old enough but have not finished high school, have not earned a GED or are not enrolled in a qualifying education program. Immigration experts said that anecdotally, they are hearing about spikes in enrollment for adult-education programs nationwide as unauthorized immigrants seek to qualify for Deferred Action. No official study has been conducted on that issue.

Since the application period opened, California has ranked as the state with the highest number of applicants — more than 128,000. Texas ranks second with slightly more than 72,000, followed by New York, Illinois and Florida.

Mexico has topped the list of applicants’ countries of origin, with 338,334 applications. The other nations in the top five are El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala and Peru.

The application process includes a biometrics appointment with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to take fingerprints, verification of various categories of information and a background check.

Immigration attorney Vidal Cordova has been volunteering at the Alliance San Diego workshops for the law firm Jacobs & Schlesinger in downtown San Diego, which co-hosts those events. Cordova helps prescreen applicants and assists with filing applications for youths who are ready to do so.

The initial workshops were daylong events that attracted hundreds of young people, and now up to 50 come per session, Cordova said. The next workshop is set to take place Wednesday.

One workshop participant has been Alejandra Garcia of Chula Vista, who is in the process of applying after saving enough money to pay the $465 fee by doing graphics design work on a contract basis. Garcia, who was brought to the United States from Mexico at age 9, is now 21 and a student at Southwestern College.

“I believe a lot of undocumented youths are scared, and also one of the biggest issues is the fee,” Garcia said.

One trend seems to be that students have an advantage in the application process, said attorney Rose Kasusky of the firm Kasusky Law in downtown San Diego. Those who are in school have a more ready stable of documents to show they have been in the United States continuously since arriving here — another requirement for the Deferred Action program.

Among her cases, “(the government is) quickly adjudicating applications for when the person is in school and taking a lot longer when the applicant is no longer in school,” Kasusky said. “Maybe it’s some way of rewarding applicants who are currently in school or encouraging them to continue. It’s a really good program, it’s giving these young people a chance they didn’t have before.”

elizabeth.aguilera @utsandiego.com (619) 293-1717 Twitter: @utsdaguilera

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The Texas Tribune

Number of Deferred Action Applications on the Decline

by Julián Aguilar
March 27, 2013

Seven months after the launch of a controversial initiative to give certain undocumented immigrants a reprieve from deportation proceedings, federal data shows that only California is home to more deferred action applicants than Texas. But the overall number of those applying for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals has fallen sharply since the program began in earnest in August, which immigration lawyers say is a byproduct of the current debate over comprehensive immigration reform.

Deferred action, announced by the Obama administration in June, grants eligible applicants relief from deportation proceedings and allows them employment authorization for two years, subject to renewal, if they meet certain guidelines.

From August through March 14, about 453,600 applications have been filed with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which oversees legal immigration to the U.S. About 73,260 have come from Texas, second to California’s 128,400. A large majority of the applicants, about 338,300, have Mexican roots, with those from El Salvador a distant second at 18,500. About 16,000 applications have been denied, according to USCIS statistics.

Since peaking in September, when the agency was receiving more than 5,700 applications a day, the number of applications has dipped by more than 300 percent. In March, the agency has been getting about 1,680 applications per day.

“If they had not already applied for DACA, some of them were holding off until after the election, and now they are holding off to see what kind of immigration reform comes,” said Jackie Watson, an Austin-based immigration attorney whose office has filed several dozen DACA applications. “I tell them: ‘Look, take advantage of every single opportunity you can with these guys because you don’t know what form the immigration reform is going to take.’”


Since his re-election, President Obama has said immigration reform is one of his second-term priorities. Though a bill has yet to be filed, Congress and the White House are crafting their own versions of an overhaul. Both plans include a pathway to citizenship and include a strong border-enforcement component.

Deferred action, Watson explained, is more broad-based. That means that certain factors that could make one inadmissible after immigration reform takes shape don’t necessarily apply.

“You could have a million red flags that could make you ineligible for a green card but still be eligible for DACA,” she said.

Approval times have also started to lag, which Watson credits, at least in part, to the government’s public relations strategy. Leading up to the election, she said, applications were processed within three months. Now those wait times are growing to as much as six months.

“I knew we were going to have some approvals before the election and sure enough we did,” she said.

During a deferred action roundtable discussion last fall with stakeholders, USCIS Director Alejandro Mayorkas said the goal was to process applications in four to six months, though he said that paperwork wouldn’t necessarily be processed “first in, first out.”

Immigration reform timeline

Until federal lawmakers put forth an immigration reform bill that has a chance of passing, Watson said she and other attorneys would probably keep encouraging undocumented immigrants to apply for deferred action. If immigration reform passes within the two-year reprieve, the immigrant doesn’t have to reapply for a new permit, she said.


Across the country, supporters of reform with a pathway to citizenship are hopeful that the U.S. Senate will put forth a plan next month. Jeremy Robbins, the director of the Partnership for a New American Economy, a bipartisan group of business owners and elected officials that advocates for immigration reform, told The Texas Tribune that the Senate is likely on track to propose a bill in April. The partnership’s members include former and current San Antonio Mayors Henry Cisneros and Julián Castro, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and El Paso Mayor John Cook. Robbins said Republicans appear to be warming to the idea of a comprehensive plan that includes a pathway to citizenship, which was evident last week when U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., told an audience at the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce that he supported bringing immigrants out of the shadows. Four of the eight senators crafting the upper chamber’s bill are also Republicans.

“When you start looking at a path for citizenship, it’s good for the economy because it’s going to get people who are more vested in the system,” Robbins said. “It’s good for society and as more and more Republican and conservative leaders make that case. … I think it will be much easier for people in places like Texas and around the country to get on board, and I think that is certainly in the direction we’re going.”

A recent poll, however, indicates Texans pushing for comprehensive reform have a ways to go to persuade their own. A February 2013 University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll found most Republicans here oppose comprehensive immigration reform that includes a “path to citizenship.” Tea Party Texans are even stronger in their opposition.

Robbins said that is more of a messaging issue.

“I think a lot of the way this issue has been discussed for decades, with terms like ‘amnesty’ and ‘comprehensive,’ which to some degree has become a loaded term, you can find animosity to that,” he said. “But when you talk about the core concept about modernizing the immigration system about making it so we bring people into the economy to pay taxes so we have a legal way going forward to get the workers we need so we don’t get to the same place 10 years down the line, those are things people support by wide margins.”

But some groups label the newfound GOP support as skeptical. The Federation for American Immigration Reform, or FAIR, a self-described nonprofit, public-interest organization that seeks to limit legal and illegal immigration, said Paul’s makeover was geared toward vote-getting.

“Senator Paul's embrace of comprehensive immigration reform stems from his belief that amnesty will garner votes for Republicans,” the group wrote on its site.

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