Thousands of DACA permits will start expiring March 5, despite court rulings

For the past four years, Nephtali Moreno, an undocumented immigrant from Mexico, has been granted deportation protection and a work permit through the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

But the Phoenix resident's DACA permit expires on March 16.

Like thousands of other "dreamers," he will lose his deportation protections and work permits—at least temporarily — despite a ruling Monday by the Supreme Court that essentially allows the DACA program to continue past a March 5 termination date set by the Trump administration.

The Supreme Court ruling was good news for Moreno and other DACA recipients. It means they can continue to apply for 2-year renewals.

But U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services did not begin accepting renewals until Jan. 13. It takes three to five months for USCIS to process renewals.

Many if not most of those with DACA permits that expire soon, including Moreno, may still see their lives upended because they haven't had time to send in renewal applications or because their applications are still being processed.

The consequences could be severe. Without a DACA permit, Moreno will again be vulnerable to being detained and deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he will have to quit his job, and he will lose his Arizona driver's license, which expires with his federal work permit.

"It does seem pretty overwhelming," Moreno said of the prospect of living without his DACA permit.

Taking longer to process

Typically, it takes USCIS at least 90 days to process DACA renewals, but lately it has taken longer. The agency is overwhelmed with a backlog of immigration cases fueled by additional hurdles imposed under the Trump administration, said Stephan Yale-Loehr, who teaches immigration law at Cornell University.

The longer processing time means thousands of DACA recipients whose permits expire in March, and possibly later, are at risk of losing their work permits and deportation protections until their renewals come through.

A total of 13,090 DACA permits are due to expire in March, according to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Another 5,320 DACA permits expire in April and nearly 14,000 more in May, according to USCIS.

"Technically they won't be able to work until the DACA renewal comes through, and so that poses problems for both them and their employers, because their employers technically cannot continue to legally employ them after their DACA-issued work permit has expired," Yale-Loehr said.

And while ICE officials have said the agency won't specifically target DACA recipients whose permits expire, if they come across them during other enforcement actions they won't ignore them, he said.

"Absolutely it's a big disruption and causes a lot of uncertainty," Yale-Loehr said. "Employers don't know what to do, people worry about being picked up while they are waiting for their renewal to come through. People are afraid to buy a house because they are not sure if they are going to be allowed to remain in the U.S. So there is a lot of fear in many different ways."

The uncertainty underscores why Congress needs to pass legislation addressing the legal status of dreamers, Yale-Loehr said.

Trump announced in September that he was rescinding the DACA program on March 5, arguing that former President Barack Obama had created it unconstitutionally through executive action. He gave Congress until that date to pass legislation to address the legal status of undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children, including nearly 800,000 approved for DACA, of which about 690,000 were enrolled at the beginning of September.

But with less than a week until the deadline, Republicans and Democrats in Congress remain deadlocked over a solution, complicated further by Trump's insistence that sharp cuts to legal immigration and significant increases in border security and immigration enforcement must now be part of any deal that legalizes dreamers.

U.S. Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., has introduced legislation that would extend the DACA program for three years in exchange for funding the first three years of Trump's border security proposal, including the start of a wall he has promised to build on the southern border with Mexico.

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To keep pressure on Congress, several hundred Catholic proponents of DACA legislation staged an act of civil disobedience inside the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, said Joseph Fleming, director of Catholic organizing for the PICO National Network, a faith-based advocacy organization.

Forty faith leaders, including several Catholic nuns were arrested during the civil disobedience, organizers said.

"We are hoping to create the dynamic for some kind of breakthrough that will disrupt the current stalemate and create the conditions for some kind of solution for dreamers," Fleming said, adding that proponents oppose further militarization of the border or an increase in deportations as part of the deal.

Judges rule against White House

A federal district court judge in January ruled the Trump administration improperly terminated DACA and issued a temporary injunction blocking the government from ending the program. On Feb. 13, a second federal court judge reached a similar conclusion.

In response to the first court order, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services on Jan. 13 again began accepting renewal applications from DACA recipients.

Moreno said he delayed mailing in his renewal application as he struggled to come up with the $495 USCIS charges to process the applications. He finally mailed his renewal application in on Friday, after receiving a $495 grant from Chicanos por la Causa, a Phoenix-based non-profit social service agency.

The agency created a fund with private donations to help dreamers cover the cost of applying for DACA, said Maria Jesus Cervantes, a spokeswoman for the agency. But the fund has run out of money, and Moreno received the last grant, she said.

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Moreno said he expects to be without his DACA permit for several months once it expires on March 16. His Arizona driver's license, which is tied to his DACA permit, expires on the same date.

He most likely will have to quit his job earning $16 an hour working a night shift assembling wall panels and roof and floor frames for a construction company in Phoenix.

"My job is kind of in jeopardy right now," he said.

Moreno, 21, has lived in the U.S. for 16 years. Originally from Obregon, Sonora, he was brought to the U.S. from Mexico when he was five.

He said he needs money to pay the rent on a house he shares with his mom, a sister, an uncle and his uncle's parents. "Economically it’s going to affect me and my family," Moreno said.

He said he will likely resort to doing landscaping and other work for cash.

Here since she was 1

Maria Santillan is also worried she will soon lose her job. The 19-year-old Glendale resident's DACA permit expires on March 8, along with her driver's license. She has lived in the U.S. since she was 1, and is originally from the Mexican state of Nayarit.

She mailed her renewal application on Jan. 20, a week after the agency announced it had begun accepting renewals again.

A month passed before Santillan was called in by USCIS to submit her fingerprints and other biometric information. It could take another month or more for her renewal application to be approved.

Santillan said she works at a clothing store in Arrowhead. With the money she earns, she pays tuition at Phoenix College, where she is studying to become a forensic technician.

When she informed her supervisor at work that her DACA permit expires on March 9, her supervisor told her to put in her two-week notice but promised to hire her back once her renewal is approved.

In the meantime, her father doesn't want her driving after her license expires. He is afraid she could be arrested for driving without a license, which could then cause her to be turned over to immigration authorities and deported, she said.

As a precaution, she said she will carry around the receipt showing she has applied to renew her DACA permit in case she encounters immigration authorities.

Until she receives her DACA renewal, "this will affect just about everything in my life," she said.