WASHINGTON, DC — DACA recipients on FWD.us’ staff released the following statement today after the Trump Administration issued a new memorandum to radically weaken DACA protections for DACA recipients:

“The Trump Administration’s decision today to radically weaken DACA protections for Dreamers like us makes it clear that this Administration is willing to do whatever it takes – including ignoring a clear directive from the Supreme Court – in order to advance its hateful, anti-immigrant agenda and separate our families

“Today’s action is as absurd as it is offensive to hundreds of thousands of Dreamers like us who have grown up in the United States since childhood, and to our families and communities. In addition to cutting the DACA program’s length in half, the new memo excludes hundreds of thousands of new DACA applicants who, like us, deserve to be shielded from deportation in the only country they know as home. Denying these Dreamers the opportunity to continue their lives here is cruel and chaotic. Make no mistake that this two-step dismantling of the DACA program will lay the groundwork for deporting Dreamers like us if Trump is reelected.

“At a time when an unprecedented global health crisis has taken the lives of nearly 150,000 Americans, the President’s obsession with deporting Dreamers and perpetuating family separation is outrageous and deeply disturbing. Regardless of what this Administration and its enablers do, we will never go back into the shadows, nor will we give up fighting for justice – for ourselves, and the millions of other immigrants in this country who deserve to be recognized as the Americans we truly are.”

Background
The Trump Administration issued a new memo today blocking Dreamers from filing new DACA applications and restricting the protections for existing DACA recipients. Just weeks ago, in an opinion written by Chief Justice Roberts, the Supreme Court ruled that the President acted unlawfully in his attempts to terminate the DACA program and deport Dreamers.

Last month, a new POLITICO/Morning Consult poll found that a majority of Trump voters (69%) support protecting Dreamers from deportation. Support for Dreamers swells to more than 85% across the American public. Only 12% of Trump voters believe Dreamers should be deported. President Trump should listen to the Supreme Court and the 85% of the American public who support Dreamers instead of embarking on another moral and politically terrible effort to purge DACA recipients from every corner of the nation. The President should abandon his efforts to deport Dreamers immediately.