Hundreds of half-drunk college students were interrupted by a bullhorn Tuesday night outside the White House as about a dozen immigration reform activists snaked through the tightly packed crowd that assembled as Donald Trump’s surprise win became clear.

As young members of the mostly white crowd climbed trees, passed joints and sang the fraternity soundtrack hits “Sweet Caroline” and “Don't Stop Believin',” the small group of mostly non-white young activists shouted emotionally, “Undocumented -- here to stay!”

The accuracy of the defiant chant is unclear. Trump ran for the presidency on an immigration platform of more deportations and the immediate termination of what he calls illegal executive amnesty issued by President Barack Obama. But he also has said at times he has “a big heart” on the issue and wants to be “fair but firm," with the removal of violent criminals a priority.

Now, nearly 1 million young immigrants face a worrying situation. They gave federal authorities personal information, including a list of every address they have called home, in order to gain protected status, federal work permits and access to state driver’s licenses under a 2012 executive action called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, designed for young people living unlawfully in the U.S. as a result of their parents’ actions.

In addition to possibly losing their jobs and other benefits given in renewable two-year blocks, the young immigrants naturally worry that they have provided authorities the information needed to locate, detain and ultimately deport them.

The legality of the presidential action that created DACA was indirectly questioned as part of a court case that has stalled an expansion of eligibility and Obama’s attempt to create a similar program for parents of U.S. citizens and permanent residents.

The young people commonly called “dreamers” after the acronym of the failed DREAM Act generally are viewed with greater public sympathy than other unlawful immigrants, and they’re hoping that Trump won’t end the program.

In the meantime United We Dream, the advocacy network behind the White House chants and similar awareness-raising efforts around the country, is calling on Obama to hasten the renewal of DACA grants and freeze deportations, and for declarations of safe harbor from local authorities.

But prominent immigration law experts say Obama may have no grander options to protect the group from worst-case scenarios, and a novel legal approach has yet to emerge.

A mass pardon would not normalize the dreamers’ immigration status and the president lacks the power to unilaterally grant citizenship or permanent residency status, experts say.

Congress can pass legislation giving the group legal status, but that appears unlikely. Obama could grant honorary citizenship, but that rarely offered status may be legally meaningless.

“I’m sure [Obama is] going to try to think creatively with his legal advisers to see if they can think of a legal mechanism that would allow them to survive the undoing of the executive action by Trump. But at this point, I don’t have any good ideas that I would advise them on," says Stephen Yale-Loehr, a law professor at Cornell University.

“Executive actions are unilateral actions by a president and what one president does, another president can take away,” he says, expressing doubt that immigrants would be successful filing lawsuits demanding continuation of the status quo.

Yale Law School professor Cristina Rodriguez says she has heard immigration advocates mention the use of pardons for the crime of illegally entering the country. She says that offense keeps some people with U.S. citizen spouses or children from acquiring permanent residency. But it's not a sweeping fix.

"Most dreamers aren’t actually eligible for visas because they don’t have the right family relationships or meet any of the grounds that would allow you to apply," Rodrigues says. "It would take time even for those who are eligible," perhaps months or years after a pardon.

Rodrigues says she's unsure what will happen, but that the collection of personal information could prove problematic.

“That was always the risk with these programs, that a subsequent administration would use the information in a way that would lead to their deportation," she says. "I’d be surprised if that happened on a large scale, but I don’t want to suggest anything is past whoever is coming into power next.”

Though it would be possible to pardon people for entering the U.S. illegally -- a crime -- it may not be possible to pardon people for living unlawfully in the U.S., which is considered a civil offense even though detention and forcible ejection are consequences.

"Being in the United States unlawfully is not a crime, so unlawful presence is nothing that needs pardoning," says UCLA law professor Hiroshi Motomura.

Motomura says the outgoing Obama administration could try to expedite processing of two-year renewals for DACA recipients in the hope that the Trump administration would end the program gradually. But the renewals would not tie Trump's hands.

Josh Blackman, an immigration expert at the South Texas College of Law, says "immediate suspension would be extremely chaotic," with recipients ordered to surrender work permits. He says it's unclear if recipients of state-issued driver's licenses could be compelled to return them.

Not everyone's convinced the worst will come.

Jose Loayza, a Utah-based attorney who handles immigration cases, says he's hopeful Trump will take a compassionate approach and keep DACA intact.

"The idea we accepted from him was that he wanted to act compassionately toward immigrants but within the legal framework. We need to hold him to that," says Loayza, a lawful immigrant from Peru who founded a group formerly called "Illegals for Trump."

Loayza believes that Trump's win could counterintuitively help unlawful residents. Republicans in Congress would block a Democratic president's immigration proposals, he says, but Trump might be able to strike a deal.

"Dreamers need something more permanent, more stable" anyhow, he says.

Statistics on the program show 844,931 people applied for DACA status as of June, with three-quarters later seeking a two-year renewal.

About 78 percent are Mexican citizens, with 4 percent from El Salvador and less than 3 percent from Guatemala and Honduras. Many come from outside the Americas, with nearly 10,000 from South Korea and several thousand from India and the Philippines. About 2,000 are from Poland.