A federal judge put the final nail in the coffin of the Trump administration’s efforts to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program when he ordered the Obama-era program fully restored and DHS to publish a public notice by Monday saying it would accept new applicants.
It’s also another nail in the coffin of congressional control over our immigration. Trump gave Congress a chance to reform the program in 2017 but neither side could agree on limitations. Eventually, the president figured that the only way to get reform was by ending the program entirely and forcing Congress to start from scratch.
Advocates for “DREAMers” scuttled that idea, fighting the administration at every turn. Now, the open borders radicals have gotten exactly what they want. Not through an act of Congress, but a ruling from a Clinton-appointed judge.
Garaufis’s ruling centered around a memo acting Homeland Security secretary Chad Wolf issued in July that curtailed DACA recipients’ work permits to a year and banned new applicants. The court ruled last month that Wolf had ascended to the post in violation of the Homeland Security Act of 2002, and said Friday that the memo was void. The order mandates the White House administer DACA under the guidelines that were in place when the program was first created during the Obama administration.
“The court believes that these additional remedies are reasonable,” Garaufis wrote. “Indeed, the Government has assured the court that a public notice along the lines described is forthcoming.”
Once Chad Wolfe being named director of Homeland Security was ruled illegal, the writing was on the wall. Trump’s failure to name a permanent DHS secretary — and several other cabinet-level appointees — was attacked by the lawfare experts on the left who took them down on technicalities.
“Thousands of young people who should have been eligible for deportation protection and work authorization have been waiting for over three years to access this life-changing program and live with peace of mind in the country they call home,” said Fwd.us President Todd Schulte. “It is well past time for DHS to finally follow the repeated judicial orders and begin to accept these applications.”
The idea that these young people were sitting on pins and needles waiting to be deported is absurd. If they were obeying the law, they had no more to fear than any other illegal alien. And we all know, that’s not much.
Despite what advocates say about Trump’s “racist” policies, it’s important that the power over immigration remain in the hands of Congress. Barack Obama’s executive orders on immigration have been found to be mostly unconstitutional. His plan to legalize millions of people through chain migration and refusal to deport other millions threatened to be a power grab against Congress. The courts put a halt to it, but for how long?
The new breed of federal judge that will be named by Biden will care more about “social justice” than the Constitution. That doesn’t bode well for Congress — especially one in gridlock like this next one will be.
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