The previous president signed the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals bill into law in 2012. It grants you work authorization and legal residence in the United States for two years under certain circumstances. The most important qualification is that you were younger than 16 when you entered the U.S. The purpose of DACA was to prevent immigration enforcement against people who came to the United States as young children and who have known no other home.
According to CBS News, the current administration attempted to discontinue DACA in 2017. A Supreme Court decision put a temporary halt to their efforts. However, the administration has recently put new limits on DACA protections.
How did the Supreme Court decision affect DACA?
The current administration attempted to end DACA with a memo in 2017. The case went to the Supreme Court. In June, the Supreme Court ruled that the reason the administration gave for ending DACA violated the law.
This ruling prevented the administration from ending DACA under the terms expressed in the memo. However, it did not prevent the administration from attempting to end DACA under a different rationale. It did not address DACA’s legality one way or the other.
What recent changes has the administration made?
Despite the Supreme Court decision, the current administration continues to express doubts about DACA’s legality. In response, the head of the Department of Homeland Security has made certain changes to the program limiting its protections.
Originally, DACA beneficiaries were eligible to extend the protections every two years. Under the new guidelines, only one-year extensions are available. The new guidelines also reject hundreds of thousands of DACA petitions from people not currently enrolled in the program.