ACLU of Nebraska Statement on States Using Trump Administration to End DACA

LINCOLN, Neb – State officials from Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia sent a letter yesterday to Attorney General Sessions urging the Trump administration to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. The letter says that if Trump phases out DACA, the states would dismiss the current lawsuit against the Deferred Action for Parents of Americans program, which was filed during the Obama administration. The states said that if the administration does not end DACA, the lawsuit will be amended to include both programs.

Danielle Conrad, ACLU of Nebraska Executive Director, said:

“We are deeply disappointed that Attorney General Doug Peterson has aligned himself with a small set of radical out-of-state public officials to target Nebraska DACA youth or “dreamers”. It is wrong for these states’ attorneys general to play politics with the health, well-being, and the future of these successful, yet vulnerable, young people and it is particularly wrong for our attorney general to target our young Nebraska dreamers.

“The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, is a program that changed the lives of hundreds of thousands of young people who came to the United States when they were young children. The DACA program allows such young people, or “dreamers”, to work, pursue an education, and positively contribute to our communities so long as they are going to school or working and leading successful, law-abiding lives. In the last two years, the Nebraska Legislature have voiced strong support for Nebraska dreamers. In 2015, and again in 2017, Nebraskans across the political spectrum showed strong support for dreamers. This support was strongly voiced by representatives of the Nebraska faith leaders, the business community, institutions of higher education, agricultural leaders, and countless Nebraska families. The ACLU is proud to stand with Nebraskans from across the political spectrum to support Nebraska dreamers. We should continue to work across the political spectrum to fix our broken immigration system. This is what real leaders do. Attorney General Doug Peterson’s misguided and politically motivated use of his office to target our states’ young people only brings the national political division in this country to Nebraska.”

Statement from ACLU Nationwide is available here: https://www.aclu.org/news/aclu-statement-states-urging-trump-administration-end-daca