Tuesday, March 17, 2020

Consequences, Not Green Cards, for Young ILLEGAL Immigrants

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Why have the immigrant caravans marching toward our southern border stopped? In large measure it's because Washington started imposing consequences on those who flouted both international and U.S. immigration law.
The lesson is clear: Enforcing immigration laws deters illegal behavior.
That lesson should also be applied to illegal immigrants already in the U.S.— including DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) recipients. Lawmakers seeking to give green cards to those here illegally have not learned that lesson. If they prevail, they will end up encouraging another tide of illegal immigration.
The Trump administration’s decision to rescind DACA has been challenged, and the U.S. Supreme Court is expected to issue its decision this summer. What will happen to DACA recipients then?
If the court finds DACA to be lawful, DACA recipients would retain their status of deferred action from removal (with work authorization), but they still would not have lawful or permanent resident status.
If, as is more likely the case, the court holds that DACA was unlawful, DACA recipients would presumably lose both their work authorization and their “deferred action” status. Their immigration status would automatically revert to unlawful.
In either scenario, providing DACA recipients with lawful permanent status would require an act of Congress — something now under discussion in Washington.
Many argue that so-called Dreamers should be exempted from immigration law because they were mere children, brought here illegally by their parents. It would be cruel, they say, to deport them to a country they don’t even remember.
But relatively few Dreamers were babes in arms when entering the country. Many were teenagers, according to Department of Homeland Security data. When DACA was implemented, it covered those who entered the U.S. before their 16th birthday and were no older than 30 by June 2012. The largest numbers of DACA recipients are now 21-35 years old, which would have made them 13-27 years old in 2012, when the program was announced. Further, most are fluent in the language of their native countries.
All Dreamers, however, have one thing in common: They are unlawfully present in this country. Offering amnesty to them — or any other group here illegally — would only encourage more illegal immigration.
Read the rest from Lora Ries HERE,

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