Newsweek
By Lauren Walker
November 21, 2014
If there is one thing the
immigration activist community can agree on, it’s that Obama promised
change a long time ago. But thoughts as to whether the substance of his
executive order is enough to warrant the wait
are not as harmonious.
In a prime-time address on
Thursday night, Obama announced a slew of executive actions, most
notably one that would give up to 5 million undocumented immigrants
relief from the threat of deportation. He offered the
undocumented parents of U.S. citizens the chance to register with the
government, pay taxes and avoid being deported for three years,
providing the parents have been in the country for more than five years.
Obama also extended this deal to anyone who came
to the U.S. as a child before January 1, 2010, regardless of their
current age.
“My first thought was that
this was a very historic step,” said Steven Choi, executive director of
the New York Immigration Coalition. Choi explained that opening a door
of opportunity for millions of undocumented
immigrants is exactly what organizations like his have been fighting
for, especially over the last two years. While he admitted that the
details of Obama’s speech were “a mixed bag,” he concluded that he was
happy with the president’s bold move and that the
executive order could have been smaller than what he gave to the
immigrant community.
But not all activists were
as thrilled. “While this is undoubtedly a step in the right direction,”
said Juan Escalante, an online activist and blogger, “a lot of people
are disillusioned because we still don’t have
immigration reform. Though it’s only temporary...people like my parents
are going to be left out of something that could potentially change our
lives entirely.”
Escalante and his parents
came to the United States in 2000 when he was 11 years old on a visa.
When it came time to renew, the family’s lawyer advised them to apply
for a Green Card instead because they were “sure
to get one.” “We became undocumented by way of our lawyer,” he said.
While Escalante is a beneficiary of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), his parents have lived in fear of deportation every day
since losing their secure stay.
But some are more skeptical
of the program. “Assuming that the program is like deferred action you
would probably have to renew it through USCIS [United States Citizenship
and Immigration Services],” said Angy Rivera,
core member at the New York State Youth Leadership Council (NYSYLC).
“But that is also under the assumption that the program continues
running after Obama leaves office. It’s literally like giving your whole
life over to immigration officials and you are not
on the path to citizenship.”
Not only is there fear
amongst the community that after three years of relief, they could be
easily found and deported by way of the information they provided,
Rivera said, but many are afraid that having lived under
the radar for so long, they may not have sufficient proof to qualify in
the first place and putting them in jeopardy instantly. Rivera predicts
that these considerations could inhibit the number of people who apply,
and therefore benefit from the new program.
Obama also ordered
additional resources to be allocated to the southern border in order to
curb the number of illegal crossings and called for reprioritizing
deportations—expelling criminals first and dropping low
concern cases.
Cesar Vargas, co-director of
the Dream Action Coalition, called allocating resources to the border
to help immigration agents go after the worst of the worst a critical
reform. “We need to make sure we are allocating
resources to investigate crime, foreign threats, inside our borders and
outside our borders rather than wasting literally millions of dollars
deporting a grandma,” he said. But others rejected the idea that the
border was insecure and needed additional resources.
“The fact is border
crossings are not determined by the number of boots on the ground and
drones in the sky and fences along the border. They are really driven by
larger socio-economic factors,” Choi said. Although
he is unconvinced about the necessity of increased militarization, he
felt optimistic about Obama’s announcement that his administration would
prioritize deporting criminals. “I think it is something new,” he said.
“This is the administration really trying
to live up to what they said they had been doing all along.”
Escalante and Rivera, however, felt less assured by the president’s promise to curtail the deportation of non-criminals.
“As a person impacted by
this, it doesn't give me any more security,” Escalante said. He
emphasized that deporting dangerous criminals has always been the
priority, but based on the numbers of people deported by what
he calls Obama’s “deportation machine” suggests otherwise. “The problem
is differentiating between a parent who is making their ends meet to
put a roof over their heads and food on their table versus that other
individual,” he said.
According to a recent Pew
study, the Obama administration has averaged 400,000 annual deportations
since 2009. A record number of immigrants, 438,421, were sent home
during 2013.
“I want to see how that
actually plays out,” Rivera said. “In past speeches the president has
always said we are not deporting law abiding immigrants, we are not
deporting parents, we are not deporting ‘good immigrants.’
But that’s not true. In reality parents and children, young people and
older people have been deported for a routine traffic stop.”
“Hopefully the numbers reflect who we should be going after,” Vargas said.
For Escalante, the executive
order did not compensate for the delay. “This is something that the
president has continuously promised us since he took office,” he said.
“People will blow this out of proportion and
use this in their fundraising emails and try to say ‘yeah we did it’
but it doesn't do anybody any favors.”
“This could have happened in
the summer,” Escalante said. “We essentially wasted three or four
months waiting for this for no reason whatsoever. And it’s not just time
in terms of this Congress, it’s time in peoples’
lives … What is going to happen to all those people that have been
deported whose children are now in foster care, whose families have been
torn apart and who have no option but to watch their families grow up
from afar?”
Rivera agreed. “I think that
this could have been done way earlier if it wasn’t used as a political
pawn, as a political tool for election season. And I think it completely
backfired, holding it off until after election
season. Now, looking back, had we approached it with a piecemeal
solution 10 years ago we could have a lot more done than if we had tried
to push for something huge,” she said.
But Choi feels this is a
welcome first step in a long journey toward a big solution. “We need to
continue to fight and push for a comprehensive solution that can address
all these things,” he said. He also explained
that activists would have to start mobilizing immediately in order to
ensure that those who are newly impacted are provided with high quality,
low-cost services.
“Whenever you have this kind
of rollercoaster ride, people in any kind of campaign will have their
differences and yet I don’t want to make too much of those differences
because we continue to see the overall picture
and fight together,” Choi said.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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