Reading Assignment: Supreme Court Stops the Cancellation of the DACA Program

Supreme Court Stops the Cancellation of the DACA Program

In September 2017, President Donald Trump ordered an end to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. It is called DACA for short. He said the program was illegal. On June 18, the United States Supreme Court ruled that Trump could not end the program. 

DACA began under President Barack Obama in 2012. It currently provides legal protection for 650,000 young undocumented immigrants. 

DACA is a program for young people who were brought into the United States without permission. Many of these young people did not choose to come illegally. Many were brought by their parents as very young children. DACA gives these people, called "Dreamers," permission to live and work in the United States. 

For now, the young immigrants are still protected from deportation. They may also continue to work in the United States.

Second Court Decision Against Trump

It was the second decision the court made against Trump in June.  The court also ruled that it's illegal to fire people because they're gay or transgender.

Five of the nine justices voted Trump could not end DACA. Trump has been outspoken about his views against immigration since he ran for president in 2016. He is running for re-election in November. 

On Twitter, Trump wrote that the court's decisions were "horrible and politically charged." He added that the decisions were a "shotgun blast into the face" of Republicans and conservatives. Trump ended the tweet with "Vote Trump 2020!" 

In a second tweet, he wrote, "Do you get the impression that the Supreme Court doesn't like me?"

Government Did Not Have A Good Enough Explanation

John Roberts is the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Roberts wrote that the court did not decide if DACA should continue or not. The court only decided that the government did not have a good enough explanation for ending DACA. For example, the explanation did not consider how ending DACA would create hardships for DACA recipients. 

Roberts said the government could try again with a better explanation. However, the process would probably take months. 

Stephen Yale-Loehr studies immigration law. He says there's no way it would happen before November's presidential election. 

The court's four conservative justices disagreed with the decision. One of them is Justice Clarence Thomas. Thomas wrote that the other justices were just trying to avoid making a controversial, but correct, decision.  

Justice Brett Kavanaugh says the government's actions were appropriate.  

DACA recipients were ecstatic about the ruling.

Cesar Espinosa leads FIEL, a group that supports immigrants. He says FIEL will continue to work on behalf of immigrants. 

Dreamers Share Their Happiness

Espinosa said FIEL was overwhelmed with calls after the court's decision was posted. Dreamers want to share their happiness about being able to stay in the country for a while longer. 

Chuck Schumer is the Democratic leader of the Senate. The Senate is one of two lawmaking bodies in the United States. "These kids, these families, I feel for them, and I think all of America does," Schumer said. 

DACA was created in 2012. Congress and President Obama could not agree on new immigration laws. Obama decided to formally protect people from being deported and allow them to work legally in the U.S. 

However, being tough on immigration was a major part of Trump's campaign for president. Less than eight months after taking office, Trump ended DACA.

Immigrants, civil rights groups and others sued the government. The courts paused Trump's plan to end DACA.  

The government has been allowing DACA recipients to extend their status for another two years. This has allowed hundreds of thousands of DACA recipients to stay in the U.S. However, no new DACA applications have been accepted since 2017. Yale-Loehr says it will still take time for new applications to be accepted again. 

The Supreme Court fight over DACA has been slow. In 2018, the Supreme Court refused to hear the case. The justices began hearing arguments in November 2019, and took seven months to make a decision.

It is not the first time the court has disagreed with how the government changed a law. A similar situation happened in 2019. In the end, the court forced the government to take a citizenship question off the 2020 census.

Source: www.newsela.com, "Supreme Court rejects Trump bid to end young immigrants' protections'