Donald Trump has not made a final decision on the fate of nearly 800,000 young undocumented migrants, the White House said Thursday, after reports said the president was poised to end protections for so-called “Dreamers” as early as Friday.

The president has been weighing the fate of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca), the 2012 Obama policy that lifted the threat of deportation for immigrants who were brought to the US before they were 16.

Trump has faced pressure from the right to end the program, which conservatives have argued is unconstitutional and sought to challenge in the courts.

On Thursday, reporting by Fox News and Reuters said the president was ready to announce the phasing out of the program in its current form.

Reuters reported that one senior administration official described the situation in the White House as a “tug-of-war” between factions in favor of the move and those opposed and added that two officials said many in the administration, believing Daca to be unconstitutional, wanted Congress to impose a legislative fix.



Under Daca, Dreamers are allowed to apply for temporary permits to study and work in the US without fear of deportation. The anonymously quoted officials said Trump would allow temporary work permits granted to Daca recipients to expire.

However, at a White House press briefing, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said: “[A] final decision on that front has not been made.”

As a candidate, Trump vowed to overturn Daca on “day one” of his presidency. On taking office, however, he signaled a potential change of heart, telling ABC News in January he was approaching the issue with “great heart”.



At a press conference in February, he said: “We are gonna deal with Daca with heart. The Daca situation is a very difficult thing for me, as I love these kids, I love kids. I have kids and grandkids, and I find it very, very hard doing what the law says exactly to do and, you know, the law is rough.”

Even as Trump unveiled a series of harsh immigration policies, his administration had thus far kept the program intact, to the frustration of staunch conservatives.

A group of Republican state attorneys general, led by Ken Paxton of Texas, sought to force Trump’s hand by imposing a deadline of 5 September for the administration to signal that it would allow the program to lapse.

Without a decision by that date, the 10 attorneys general threatened to take up the issue in courts by amending an existing lawsuit against another Obama-era immigration action to include Daca.

That suit currently concerns Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (Dapa), an executive action Obama signed in 2014 that would have protected parents of Dreamers and expanded Daca. The program has been held up in legal challenges.

In recent days, White House officials have demurred when asked about a decision on Daca. Sanders told reporters on Wednesday a lengthy review was under way and no final determination had been made.

The Trump administration’s immigration policies received a blow on Wednesday night when a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction that blocked key parts of a Texas ban on so-called sanctuary cities two days before the controversial law, known as SB4, was scheduled to go into effect.