President Obama will urge his Republican successor to consider keeping in place his signature deferred action program for immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children, despite the president-elect’s promise to terminate the executive order known as “DACA.”
Trump, who became a notorious immigration restrictionist during the 2016 election cycle, has vowed to reverse a handful of Obama’s executive actions, including those that have granted reprieve to millions of immigrants residing in the country illegally. The incoming GOP president has described DACA as an “illegal amnesty” on more than one occasion.
“I will urge the president-elect and the incoming administration to think long and hard before they are endangering the status of what for all practical purposes are American kids,” Obama told reporters on Monday during his first solo press conference at the White House since last December.
“These are kids who were brought here by their parents,” he said. “They did nothing wrong. They’ve gone to school. They have pledged allegiance to the flag … some of them have joined the military.”
The president said those currently protected by DACA are “solid, wonderful young people of good character,” and he believes most Americans “would not want to see, suddenly, those kids have to start hiding again.”
“That’s something that I will encourage the president-elect to look at,” Obama said.
