WASHINGTON – A long-stalled bipartisan effort to pass the Dream Act is getting new life since President Trump announced Tuesday he’d eliminate deportation protections for young immigrants and demanded Congress make it right.
Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) believe their bipartisan legislation to allow Dreamers a path to US citizenship now has the political urgency to pass. Some 780,000 recipients of DACA benefits could eventually be at risk of deportation if Congress fails to act.
“The clock is ticking. We are now in a countdown to deportation,” Durbin said Tuesday urging passage of the Dream Act in September.
“It’s time for us in Congress to do the right thing for America, the right thing for these young people and their families and pass the Dream Act,” Durbin added.
The Graham-Durbin legislation would allow children of immigrants who entered the US illegally to eventually earn citizenship if they graduate high school, seek a higher education, serve in the military or work lawfully for three years. They must pass security checks, pay fees, demonstrate English proficiency and have not committed a felony.
Congress has tried unsuccessfully to pass protections for young immigrant Dreamers for 16 years. Durbin introduced the first DREAM Act in 2001.
Graham was part of the bipartisan Gang of Eight that wrote comprehensive immigration reform legislation that passed the Senate in 2013. The House failed to take it up.
Graham panned President Obama’s executive action that started the DACA program as an executive overreach. But he believes Congress needs to step in and offer permanent legal protections because these children did nothing wrong and are assets to the American economy.
“When you tell them to go home, they will go back to the house they were raised in. They have no other country other than America,” Graham said.
The senators admitted they don’t have the 60 votes necessary just yet, but feel optimistic they can get them with GOP leadership expressing some willingness. Graham urged Trump to publicly campaign on the issue and personally pressure Congress to act.
“If he gets involved the people in the House are going to fall in line. The Senate won’t be your problem,” Graham predicted.
