With the DREAM Act stalled in the House and Senate, President Barack Obama on Friday announced plans to spare young undocumented immigrants from deportation in a move that could allow 800,000 students to stay in the country and seek employment.
“This is not amnesty. This is not immunity. This is not a path to citizenship. It is not a permanent fix,” Obama said at a White House briefing. Calling it a way to help students dubbed as “Dreamers,” the president described it as a stopgap measure “giving a degree of relief and hope to talented driven, patriotic young people.”
Under the policy, young people brought to the U.S. before age 16 could receive a two-year deferral from deportation with the possibility to renew that status.
Individuals also must have lived in the U.S. for at least five years, have no criminal convictions, and have graduated high school, received an honorable military discharge, or currently be attending school.
The announcement bears similarities to the DREAM Act, which would provide a pathway for citizenship to undocumented students of good character who have completed at least two years of post-secondary education. Yet while the bill passed the House of Representatives previously when that chamber was under Democratic control, it failed to gain a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Action on the bill also has ground to a halt in the current Congress.
Unlike the DREAM Act, however, the president’s latest announcement would not provide a way to citizenship—though it could help undocumented young people gain employment.
Still, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., Senate sponsor of the DREAM Act, said the Obama announcement would give young immigrants “their chance to come out of the shadows and be part of the only country they’ve ever called home.”
