Department of Homeland Security v. Board of Regents of the University of California – the DACA Case
https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6951500/DACA-Decision.pdf
DACA are the Dreamers, the children of undocumented workers; they arrived in this nation without legal authorization during their childhoods; they have grown up as Americans. DACA allowed them to apply for forbearance from deportation and for work permits if they had a clean record, graduated from high school or served in the US military and had been here continuously since 2007. There are about 700,000 DACA individuals with jobs, degrees, families, homes, schooling, and all of that is at risk.
The program was created under the Obama Administration by a memorandum from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The courts have held that the memorandum was a rule and should have been promulgated under the APA (Administrative Procedures Act) through a proper rule making procedure.
President Trump ran on a platform of deporting all 11 million undocumented immigrants on the grounds they are here illegally. His Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, told DHS to rescind the DACA program, and DHS adopted a memorandum doing so, saying DACA was illegal. The Supreme Court in a narrow 5-4 decision said the DHS memo should have been promulgated as a rule under the APA and was therefore arbitrary and capricious and illegal. In other words, they are telling the Trump Administration that you can do this (deport Dreamers, rescind DACA, uproot their lives, destroy the families they have built), but if you choose to do so, you have to do it the right way – as properly promulgated rule making under the APA. Three quarters of all Americans support a path to citizenship for the Dreamers; in fact 3/4ths support a path to citizenship for undocumented workers and their families; President Trump and his Senate allies are the roadblock.
This process of promulgating a new rule consistent with the APA’s procedures takes time. Given a second term, President Trump will certainly seek to do so. Trump tweeted today that he is going to issue a new directive compliant with the Court’s decision while engaging in more inflammatory rhetoric to the effect that the court’s decision is a shotgun blast to his supporters’ faces — hardly. Immigrants rights advocates advised all eligible to apply to do so right now while the window for seeking DACA protection is still open.
This is a very temporary victory, albeit an important and timely one. So vote in November and save the Dreamers from deportation. Vote in November and give them a path to citizenship. And write Congress now urging a path to citizenship; the bill has already passed the House and Senate Majority Leader McConnell is holding it up.