Campaign Action
The eyes of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients and their allies are on a courtroom in southern Texas today, where Judge Andrew Hanen is set to hear a politically-motivated lawsuit brought on by the state’s indicted attorney general, Ken Paxton, and six other states seeking to kill the dreams of undocumented immigrant youth once and for all.
These young people and their allies are justifiably anxious. Hanen is an anti-immigrant zealot—America’s Voice leader Frank Sharry once called him “the Joe Arpaio of the federal judiciary”—who blocked former President Obama’s 2014 immigration action, shattering the hopes millions of undocumented parents of U.S. citizens and permanent residents who would have otherwise been protected by the program.
With six years of success stories behind DACA—and no other court having ruled it unconstitutional—Hanen’s “history of opining well beyond the scope of his jurisdiction, and an anti-immigration bent,” is precisely why Paxton knocked on his door. But, if Paxton and the administration get the result they so desperately want, ”resulting conflicting injunctions could end up in the Supreme Court,” Buzzfeed reports.
Last week, Judge John Bates of the D.C. Circuit Court upheld his ruling that the administration failed to properly justify DACA’s rescission last fall, ordering officials to fully restore the program within a matter of weeks. That means that first-time applicants, previously shut out of other court orders that partially revived the program, would now get to enroll and be protected from deportation.
But if Hanen rules against DACA recipients, Vox reports, “the Trump administration will officially be under two conflicting injunctions from the courts. It will be under an order from Hanen to stop processing any DACA applications, and under orders from the judges in California and New York to continue processing DACA renewals.” It could then get kicked over the Supreme Court, which is currently split 4-4. “It’s truly uncharted territory,” Dara Lind writes.
Wednesday, Aug 8, 2018 · 7:03:19 PM +00:00
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Gabe Ortiz
No DACA ruling from Hanen today, tweeted Gus Bova of the Texas Tribune:
“Looking ahead,” he continues, “Hanen could decline to issue an injunction, issue a nationwide injunction, or a more limited injunction. His eventual order may be in direct conflict with other equivalent courts. CURRENTLY, DACA remains in effect and you may apply to renew.”
Immigrant rights advocates, unsure of how the next few weeks will unfold, have been encouraging eligible DACA recipients to renew their protections as soon as possible. “I’m worried about what tomorrow will bring and I just hope and pray that it won’t be as bad as people are predicting it to be,” 21-year-old Ana DeLeon, a senior at St. Edwards University in Texas, said. “I hope that one day in the future I can finally breathe and feel like I belong here.”
Paxton has enough of his own legal troubles to worry about, but instead he’s working hand-in-orange-hand with the Trump administration to end a sound program for no other reason than, as Jay Willis recently wrote, the GOP becoming “an entity whose core issue is fomenting hatred for immigrants.” Josh Breisblatt of the American Immigration Council adds that “up to 700,000 [people] have DACA, and the potential fate of that status could be up in the air tomorrow.”