House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said she was "heartened" by Speaker Paul Ryan's comments and thinks they open the path to compromise. | Win McNamee/Getty Images Pelosi wants to meet with Ryan to help Dreamers

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and top Hispanic lawmakers want to meet as soon as possible with Republican leaders in a bid to help young undocumented immigrants avoid losing their legal protections.

Pelosi (D-Calif.) made the request on behalf of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in a letter to Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) Friday afternoon. Earlier in the day, Ryan told a local Wisconsin radio station he didn’t think President Donald Trump should end a program that shields undocumented immigrants brought here as children, known as Dreamers, from deportation.


Pelosi said she was "heartened" by Ryan's comments and thinks they open the path to compromise.

“That is why I am writing to ask you to meet with members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and other House Democratic leaders as soon as we return next week to discuss a comprehensive legislative solution for our country's DREAMers,” Pelosi wrote.

Trump is expected to announce his decision Tuesday on whether to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) initiative. The program, started by Barack Obama, provides work permits for nearly 800,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children.

Sign up here for POLITICO Huddle A daily play-by-play of congressional news in your inbox. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

On Friday, several top Republicans, including Ryan, urged Trump to keep the program in place while Congress works out a legislative solution.

"[T]here are people who are in limbo,” Ryan told WCLO in his hometown of Janesville on Friday. “These are kids who know no other country, who were brought here by their parents and don't know another home. And so I really do believe there that there needs to be a legislative solution.”

Congressional Republicans privately worry that any move by Trump to end DACA would significantly undercut key negotiations with Democrats to fund the government and increase the nation’s borrowing limit — two must-do items in September.

“Deporting patriotic, courageous young men and women who are American in every way would be disastrous for our communities, our economy and our nation,” Pelosi wrote.

Democrats want Ryan to bring legislation known as the Dream Act to the House floor to continue DACA and create an eventual path to citizenship for the program’s participants.