President Donald Trump may soon end the controversial DACA amnesty for almost 800,000 illegals, according to a new report in Axios.
President Trump is seriously considering ending DACA, the Obama-era policy that shields some illegal immigrants from deportation, before conservative state attorneys general file a court challenge to the program.
Sources familiar with the deliberations tell Axios that Trump has made no final decision, and the White House continues to receive advice from the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice. Jeff Sessions strongly believes Trump should end DACA; DHS, however, has a more nuanced position, and Trump himself has said he’s sympathetic to the children helped by the program.
Read the entire article here.
The amnesty was created by former President Barack Obama in the run-up to the June 2012 election. Trump has continued the program since his inauguration, despite a 2016 campaign promise to quickly end the program. So far, almost 800,000 younger illegals — including many in their 30s and 40s — have gotten two-year work permits via the DACA amnesty.
A group of 10 state Attorneys General has said they will extend a successful lawsuit against Obama’s 2014 ‘DAPA’ amnesty to include the DACA amnesty on September 5. The lawsuit is likely to kill the DACA program because it has already ended the ‘DAPA’ amnesty for roughly 4 million parents of native-born children.
If Trump formally ends the DACA program, he can either cancel outright the outstanding 800,000 DACA work permits or else slowly wind the program down over the next two years by not renewing the two-year DACA work permits.
By ending the DACA program, Trump also gains more leverage to force the Democrats to accept passage of his very popular RAISE Act immigration and economic reform in 2018.
Pro-American immigration reformers worry Trump may trade his campaign-trail opposition to the DACA amnesty in exchange for a one-time appropriation of funding for his border wall in 2017. Under this “trinkets” scenario, Trump would agree to a deal in which Congress would establish a permanent amnesty for roughly 1.5 million current and future DACA recipients, in exchange for approving 2018 funds to build a small stretch of the border wall.
Reportedly, Trump’s top aides want a deal on DACA so that Democrats accept legislation offering tax cuts for major business interests.