With Dreamers Sign-On Statement
We, the undersigned state and local elected officials, law enforcement professionals, national security experts, and business, faith, education, labor, and civic leaders, are deeply disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision permitting the administration to terminate Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). We are resolved in our shared commitment to support and defend DACA recipients and Dreamers in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead. We recognize these individuals as integral members of our communities and families, and honor their contributions to our schools, workplaces, and shared prosperity as a nation.
Like all Americans, DACA recipients have suffered through the profound disruption and uncertainty caused by efforts to limit the spread of the coronavirus. To avoid inflicting additional and unnecessary chaos and fear, as Congress works to achieve an acceptable solution, we urge the president to continue allowing DACA recipients to renew their status and we ask that the Department of Homeland Security pledge to refrain from deporting them.
Since June 2012, more than 825,000 young people who came to the United States many years ago as children have come forward, passed background checks, and received permission to live and work lawfully in America. With DACA, they have advanced their education; started businesses; contributed to their families and communities; become teachers, health care professionals, and enlisted service members; and more fully woven themselves into the fabric of our country. Our government invited them to come forward, realize their potential, and contribute to the United States—and they have done everything that we asked of them.
By choosing to end DACA and subjecting these young people to the risk of losing their jobs and being deported and separated from their families, including their more than 250,000 U.S. citizen children, we are poised to break our promise to stand by these aspiring Americans. The magnitude of this threat was underscored when the head of our nation’s immigration enforcement agency declared his intention to proceed with deportations once recipients are forced to see their DACA protections expire.
In addition to being contrary to our best American values, ending DACA and needlessly removing hundreds of thousands of these young people from our workforce would cost the country an estimated $10.8 billion in tax contributions each year according to the conservative American Action Forum and an estimated $24.1 billion in annual spending power according to the progressive Center for American Progress.
Shortly after his inauguration, President Trump pledged to “deal with DACA with heart.” The administration then allowed DACA to continue for six months after the president announced his intention to terminate protections in September 2017. Notwithstanding the Court ruling, the president can still allow DACA recipients to renew their lawful status.
Today, we urge the president once more to preserve DACA and continue processing deferred action applications and to direct DHS to refrain from deporting recipients. This will provide Congress an opportunity to enact legislation that replaces fear and uncertainty with permanent protections for Dreamers without hurting people, just as the bipartisan, House-passed American Dream and Promise Act, H.R. 6, would do.
As leaders of communities across the country that invested in these young people and witnessed their investments in us, we recognize and acknowledge how immigrant youth have enriched and strengthened our cities, states, schools, businesses, congregations, and families. We believe it is a moral imperative that the administration and the country know we are with them. We also invite all Americans to join us in sending assurances to Dreamers: we see you, we value you, we are working to defend you, and we will not stop until we have achieved an outcome worthy of the great Nation that binds us all together.
With Dreamers Sign-On Statement (Alternative)
We, the undersigned state and local elected officials, law enforcement professionals, national security experts, and business, faith, education, labor, and civic leaders, are deeply disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision permitting the administration to terminate Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). We are resolved in our shared commitment to support and defend DACA recipients and Dreamers in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead. We recognize these individuals as integral members of our communities and families, and honor their contributions to our schools, workplaces, and shared prosperity as a nation.
Like all Americans, DACA recipients have suffered through the profound disruption and uncertainty caused by efforts to limit the spread of the coronavirus. To avoid inflicting additional and unnecessary chaos and fear, as Congress works to achieve an acceptable solution, we urge the president and the Department of Homeland Security to pledge to refrain from deporting DACA recipients.
Since June 2012, more than 825,000 young people who came to the United States many years ago as children have come forward, passed background checks, and received permission to live and work lawfully in America. With DACA, they have advanced their education; started businesses; contributed to their families and communities; become teachers, health care professionals, and enlisted service members; and more fully woven themselves into the fabric of our country. Our government invited them to come forward, realize their potential, and contribute to the United States—and they have done everything that we asked of them.
By choosing to end DACA and subjecting these young people to the risk of losing their jobs and being deported and separated from their families, including their more than 250,000 U.S. citizen children, we are poised to break our promise to stand by these aspiring Americans. The magnitude of this threat was underscored when the head of our nation’s immigration enforcement agency declared his intention to proceed with deportations once recipients are forced to see their DACA protections expire.
In addition to being contrary to our best American values, ending DACA and needlessly removing hundreds of thousands of these young people from our workforce would cost the country an estimated $10.8 billion in tax contributions each year according to the conservative American Action Forum and an estimated $24.1 billion in annual spending power according to the progressive Center for American Progress.
Shortly after his inauguration, President Trump pledged to “deal with DACA with heart.” The administration then allowed DACA to continue for six months after the president announced his intention to terminate protections in September 2017.
Today, we urge the president and DHS to refrain from deporting recipients. This will provide Congress an opportunity to enact legislation that replaces fear and uncertainty with permanent protections for Dreamers without hurting people, just as the bipartisan, House-passed American Dream and Promise Act, H.R. 6, would do.
As leaders of communities across the country that invested in these young people and witnessed their investments in us, we recognize and acknowledge how immigrant youth have enriched and strengthened our cities, states, schools, businesses, congregations, and families. We believe it is a moral imperative that the administration and the country know we are with them. We also invite all Americans to join us in sending assurances to Dreamers: we see you, we value you, we are working to defend you, and we will not stop until we have achieved an outcome worthy of the great Nation that binds us all together.