Dreamers Vs. Deportation Force
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/0...reamers-223658
Dreamers face nightmare of Trump’s deportation force
Undocumented immigrants eager to seek relief under Obama’s executive actions could expose themselves to Trump’s mass deportation plan.
By Sarah Wheaton and Seung Min Kim
05/29/16 07:58 AM EDT
Updated 05/29/16 11:09 PM EDT
http://static2.politico.com/dims4/de...t-1160-gty.jpg
Pro-DREAM Act activists hold a mock coffin during a protest July 21, 2014, on Capitol Hill.
The Supreme Court’s deliberations over President Barack Obama’s immigration order are putting that potential deportation relief on a collision course with Donald Trump’s deportation force.
It’s still an open question whether the shorthanded court will ultimately determine that Obama has the authority to defer deportation for millions of undocumented immigrants. And until it gives its answer next month, his administration isn’t allowed to prepare for the possibility by hiring staff or creating forms.
White House officials have told immigrant advocacy groups it’ll take about two months to get everything up and running — which would put the first applications for the estimated 4.4 million eligible individuals at about September, at the earliest.
The means that people living in the shadows will possibly be exposing themselves just as Trump inches closer to the White House and decides whether to fulfill his pledge to use a deportation force to kick out the roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States.
Advocates acknowledge that people who sign up right away could pay a price.
“Are there risks? Definitely,” said George Escobar of CASA, a Maryland-based Latino advocacy group that expects as many as 20,000 people in the Washington metropolitan area to sign up as soon as they can. “Are there risks to anything that has to do with improving your status …? Of course, and we’re not going to lie. But at the same time, the opportunity is something that many people have waited decades for and will enthusiastically embrace it."
The opportunity stems from Obama’s executive action in late 2014. He not only expanded the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program — which gave the so-called Dreamers work permits and protection from being deported — but he also announced that parents of U.S. citizens and green-card holders could sign up, too. That program — Deferred Action for Parents of Americans — is known by its acronym, DAPA.
Obama’s moves came after the White House had been insisting for years that he had exhausted his legal options from the executive branch with the original DACA in 2012, and 26 states quickly mounted a legal challenge. In early 2015, a federal judge in Texas barred the Department of Homeland Security from implementing the order while the lawsuit proceeds. After a series of appeals, the eight sitting justices heard oral arguments in April about whether the implementation should be allowed to go forward.
If the court sides with Obama, the expanded DACA program will be easier to kick-start, since the forms are essentially the same. But for their parents, the administration would not only have to create new forms but also build up the staff to review them, which is expected to take a couple of months.
Election rhetoric would be likely to ramp up just as fast as the bureaucracy this summer. Advocates note, however, that it wouldn’t be so different from Obama’s original DACA initiative, launched in June 2012. The president issued that order just as Mitt Romney, who had called for “self-deportation,” was hitting the trail as the presumptive GOP nominee.
“There was a large, large wave of young men and women that signed up while the election was still kind of tenuous between Romney and Obama,” said Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), a member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. “So I think the same thing would occur, too.”
Likewise, said Rep. Linda Sánchez (D-Calif.), “If DACA and DAPA are upheld by the Supreme Court, I think there will be a rush of folks to get relief.”
Sánchez, chairwoman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, added, “People have been waiting decades now to get relief, and every time that there is an opportunity, the response is tremendous.”
There are other timing complications at play that could further narrow the window of time that the Obama administration has to implement the programs before the November elections.
If the Supreme Court rules that the programs can proceed, DAPA and the expanded DACA initiatives won’t begin right away. Under Supreme Court rules, the decision has to be sent back to the lower courts within 25 days.
Once the Supreme Court issues what is called a mandate — a certified copy of the opinion — at the end of that period, the lower courts would then have to formally lift the injunction that was put in place by District Judge Andrew Hanen in February 2015. That process, in theory, could take weeks.
Meanwhile, during that 25-day period, the losing side could also ask for a rehearing — which could delay the mandate being issued, legal experts said. Either side could also ask for the mandate to be issued more quickly, which would help expedite the process.
“Is there room for the circuit court to sit on it? Is there room for the district court to sit on it? Yeah. But would they, under the circumstances?” said David Leopold, a veteran immigration attorney. “Any delay by the lower courts would be viewed pretty dimly by everybody.”
That could push implementation into September or October, giving just over a month for the administration to approve the first wave of applications. Advocates say they’re planning to use the time in between to help people get applications ready, including compiling a decade’s worth of past addresses. Some groups will also recommend that applicants file a Freedom of Information Act request with Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol to make sure there’s nothing on the books that could trigger deportation.
Advocates say the volume of early applicants could depend on the horse-race polls. The initial wave is likely to be people who are just as interested in making a political statement — essentially daring Trump to deport them — as getting on firmer legal footing. Then there would be another lull until after the election, with applications picking up again only if Hillary Clinton wins.
“We’re hopeful that there’s something a little bit protective about large numbers of people applying for the program,” said Catholic Legal Immigration Network executive director Jeanne Atkinson.
Atkinson said she’s seeing signs that the specter of a Trump presidency is actually motivating people to register. During a recent call with affiliates around the Southeast, she said, “We were really surprised to find that there’s an uptick” in requests for help. “They want a document” in hand in case he comes into office, Atkinson said.
The White House is projecting confidence in its legal standing.
“The deferred action policies announced by the president in November 2014 are consistent with actions taken by presidents of both parties, the laws passed by Congress, and decisions made by the Supreme Court over the past half century. We continue to believe these actions are lawful and will be upheld by the Supreme Court,” said White House spokesman Peter Boogaard. “In the meantime, we continue to comply with the injunction, and, as such, are not taking any actions to implement the policies that are being challenged in the courts."
It’s no wonder that the White House is quick to stress its inaction: Hanen, the federal judge, was furious when he discovered that the administration had approved three-year extensions for 2,700 of the original DACA recipients after his February 2015 injunction, rather than the two-year extensions available under Obama’s original order.
The Justice Department reversed those extensions, but Hanen is not appeased. Last week, he not only ordered all the federal lawyers who will be involved in the case going forward to take ethics classes but also asked the DOJ to provide detailed identifying information for all 100,000 illegal immigrants who received three-year extensions in the past. Hanen said he’ll keep the list under seal until the Supreme Court rules, but he held out the possibility that he’d hand it over to authorities in the 26 states that are challenging the orders if the administration loses.
On Thursday, the youth immigrant group United We Dream delivered petitions to the Justice Department asking Attorney General Loretta Lynch not to comply, accusing Hanen of intimidation.
The high court’s short-staffed bench adds a new layer of uncertainty to the case. If the justices deadlock 4-4, then the lower courts’ prohibition stands. And even without the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia on the court, there’s still a possibility that a majority could rule against Obama.
In that outcome, Escobar can see “silver linings.”
CASA has seen record interest in applying for citizenship this year, he said. Immigrant groups that had planned to divide staff between DAPA aid and voter registration efforts will have one less thing to work on if the Supreme Court blocks Obama.
“Not that we need that much more motivation with such an anti-immigrant candidate,” Escobar said. “But this would compound that.”
Obama allies hope to see another parallel with 2012. Nationwide, Obama beat Romney among Hispanics by a 40-point margin.
