Tens of thousands of people whose Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals protection is set to expire in the next six months will lose their protection from deportation and work permits this year under the Trump administration’s plan to start phasing out the program unless they reapply for a two-year renewal by Oct. 5.
The administration said DACA, which benefits 800,000 illegal immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as minors and lets them work in the U.S., will be rescinded by March 5, 2018. Unless Congress acts to restore elements of the program that President Obama created through an executive action, those protections will start to end for people depending on when their current DACA protections are due to lapse.
For example, about 200,000 people successfully applied for the two-year renewable program in 2015, which means their DACA protections are due to end sometime this year. The Department of Homeland Security said those whose protections expire by the end of the year and others whose DACA expires between now and March 5, may apply for a two-year renewal by Oct. 5.
If the DACA renewal applications are approved, they will receive a two-year extension from the date of approval even though the program is slated to end next spring. However, there are no guarantees these reapplications will be granted.
Although tens of thousands of people could lose their DACA status if they choose not to apply in the next month, DHS press secretary David Lapan said it can be avoided by applying in time.
“Unless a DACA beneficiary whose DACA is scheduled to expire between now and March 5 chooses not to apply for renewal, those whose DACA will expire by the end of this year can apply to renew DACA and work authorization for another two years. So no one will lose DACA this calendar year unless they choose not to seek renewal,” Lapan told the Washington Examiner.
DHS said 55,258 people whose DACA privileges expire this year have already sought a renewal, and said it would handle those requests on a case-by-case basis this year.
Those whose DACA protection expires sometime after March 5, 2018 and had not applied for renewal by Sept. 5, will be unable to apply for renewal and their DACA will expire on the date stated on their documents, even if that is after the March deadline.
Many who support the program also worry that federal officials might be able to use the information submitted as part of the DACA application process, such as a home address, to make it easier to arrest and deport people.
But DHS officials on Tuesday played down the department’s plans for responding to possibly hundreds of thousands of new illegal immigrants as the program ends, and said they will continue with the “current enforcement methodology.”
“Our enforcement posture has not changed. We are still prioritizing criminal aliens and those persons … with outstanding orders of removal. There is no intent to target persons outside of those parameters,” the official said. “At this time, absent any law enforcement interest, the department will not take any action to remove DACA beneficiaries.”
The Trump administration has said that method of phasing out DACA will give Congress time to write legislation dealing with current DACA recipients, if it so chooses. That action was prompted by a group of state attorneys general that threatened in June to sue the Trump administration if it did not rescind DACA by Sept. 5.
On Monday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions told Acting DHS Secretary Elaine Duke he has legally determined DACA “was effectuated by the previous administration through executive action, without proper statutory authority and with no established end-date, after Congress’ repeated rejection of proposed legislation that would have accomplished a similar result.”
Gabby Morrongiello contributed to this report
Correction: An earlier version of this story stated tens of thousands of DACA recipients will lose protections. The article was corrected to indicate clarification from DHS that there is a way for DACA recipients to renew protections by Oct. 5.
