President Donald Trump's decision to scrap DACA six months from now—DACA being Barack Obama's deferred deportation program forDonkeyHoter via Foter.com "Dreamers," immigrants brought to this country without authorization as minors—is fiscally dumb, economically counterproductive, and morally reprehensible. The only upside of his move, which Trump didn't even have the cojones to announce himself, is that it might finally prod Congress to get off its derrière and create a path for permanent legal status for Dreamers instead of leaving their fates to presidential whims. But it's by no means certain that Congress can do this cleanly, if at all.
Congress has given the president immense statutory discretion in enforcing immigration law. And just as Obama had the legal authority to create the DACA program, Trump has the authority to scrap it, regardless of Attorney General Jeff Sessions claims that the Obama action was illegal.
Obama gave qualified Dreamers with clean records a two-year reprieve ("parole") from deportation and temporary work authorization—not permanent green cards, mind you. After that, if they had remained in school or gainfully employed and if they generally kept out of trouble, they could apply for renewal. About 800,000 people obtained DACA status out of an estimated Dreamer population of a million-plus.
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