Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals is back.
Hi, I'm Jim Hacking, immigration lawyer, practicing law throughout the United States out of our office here in St. Louis, Missouri, and in San Diego, California.
A federal judge ruled last Friday that USCIS has to begin accepting new applications for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was put into place by President Barack Obama, and it allowed young people who came to the United States by 2007, who are under the age of 16, and who had a GED or military service equivalent of a GED and military service, that they could apply for deferred action. This would allow them to temporarily pause their deportation, if they were in deportation. It allowed them to get a work card, and it also allowed them to get something called Advance Parole, which is to leave the United States and to return.
President Donald Trump tried to undo DACA and although he said, when he was running as a candidate, that he would not mess with the Dreamers, he did try to kill off DACA. But the Supreme Court ruled a few years back that the Trump administration had not followed the Administrative Procedures Act and struck down the administration's attempt to kill off DACA.
After the Supreme Court issued that ruling, this clown named Chad Wolf, who's the interim head of Homeland Security, issued a new memo, trying once again to kill it off. And these great lawyers led by a woman, who's my hero, named Karen Tumlin, filed legal challenges to that, arguing in effect that Chad Wolf had not been legally appointed to be the head of Homeland Security, which is true. That the Homeland Security Act was not followed, and that he was illegally appointed.
On Friday a federal judge agreed. He'd actually agreed earlier and now he's ordered USCIS to begin accepting brand new DACA applications today, and to allow DACA recipients to apply for Advance Parole.
Now, that's really important because if you are here on DACA and you have Advance Parole, you could leave the United States and come back on that Advance Parole. If you marry a US citizen, you'd be eligible for an immigration benefit. That would be a valid entry for purposes of adjustment.
So it's all very, very exciting. As of today, USCIS has to post a memo talking about how they're going to accept brand new applications, renewal applications, and applications for Advance Parole under DACA. And that they're going to have to do that immediately. This is a great ruling for immigrants across the country. I suppose that USCIS will, or Homeland Security, will try to appeal it. But for now it's the law of the land. USCIS is going to have to start accepting these applications as of today. It's estimated that there are a million, one million young people who are eligible for DACA, but did not have their applications in by the time that Trump tried to undo it.
So it's very exciting. If you need help with this, give us a call 314-961-8200. You can email us at [email protected]. You can join us on our Facebook group, which is called Immigrant Home. You can also follow us on YouTube and subscribe to our YouTube channel. You can find us on Instagram at hackinglawpracticellc. And every Tuesday and Thursday from 12:00 to 1:00 in the Facebook group and on YouTube, I'll be going live answering all of your questions for free.
Thanks a lot. Have a great day.