The Trump administration decided today to phase out the Obama-era program that protects from deportation people who were brought to the United States illegally as children, via KUT News.
In an announcement this morning, U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions said, while the program will expire in March, Congress could authorize the program before it officially expires.
The program gives undocumented immigrants known as "Dreamers" a work permit and legal residence for two years at a time.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton had demanded that the Trump administration make a decision on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program by Sept. 5. He threatened to sue if the administration didn't act.
“We respectfully request that the Secretary of Homeland Security phase out the DACA program,” Paxton and nine other state attorneys general wrote in a letter to the administration in June. “DACA unilaterally confers eligibility for work authorization and lawful presence without any statutory authorization from Congress.”
The following month, California's attorney general and 19 others wrote a letter to President Trump urging him to protect the program. They cited concern for the nearly 800,000 young people granted protection under DACA.
"[Paxton] is really going to be disenfranchising some of his most loyal and productive young people across the state," Caitlin Boehne, attorney and co-director of the DACA and Immigration Justice project at the Equal Justice Center, said before the administration's decision was announced.
