DACA recipients are losing status due to processing delays

S1: Welcome in San Diego. It's Jade Hindman on today's show. Why DACA recipients are losing their protected status. This is KPBS Midday Edition. Connecting our communities through conversation. Deferred action for Childhood Arrivals , or DACA , gives legal status to people who were bought in the U.S. illegally as children. The U.S. is home to almost 500,000 Doca recipients , but right now , many of them are losing their status due to administrative delays. My colleague Gustavo Solis joins me with the details. He's investigative border reporter here at KPBS. Gustavo , welcome. Hello. Hi , there. So can you first give us a refresher about what DACA is and how renewals normally work. Yeah.

S2: Yeah. As you said DACA Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals , the legal protection given to children brought in after a certain time. I believe it was 2007. So there's children brought in after that that never got Doca. But I'm diverting. It gives you legal status , a work permit. You can work legally , you can go to school , you can realize your full potential. Right? You hear about dreamers who go on to become doctors and lawyers , and it's just temporary status. It's never been codified into a big thing. There's no pathway to citizenship. It only lasts two years. So every two years you have to renew it. You pay between 5 and $600 plus attorney fees , and you do it all over again. And people have been doing this for like 14 years now. Wow.

S1: Wow. Um , but now , you know , the average wait time for processing this every two years. These applications has jumped from a few weeks to a few months. So what's going on there?

S2: Yeah , it was two weeks in fiscal year 25 This fiscal year is up to almost three months , and I've heard of cases. I've interviewed people who have been waiting six , seven , eight months. Right. And the problem with that is that with DACA , you either have it or you don't. There's no grace period. If you follow the government's guidance , they tell you , hey , reapply for it between 150 and 120 days before it expires. So that gives us enough time to process it. And you won't be stuck with this , you know , lapsed.

S1: Lapsed time lapse in your. Yeah.

S2: Which is what we're seeing. We're seeing that as soon as your status expires , you get letters from your employer saying , hey , I can't legally hire you anymore. You cannot work. You lose employment overnight. Um , and predictably , that's having really , really negative consequences in one of the most unaffordable cities in the country. San Diego. Yeah.

S1: Yeah. Do you know of any cases where folks have been deported during this lapse?

S2: Not deported , but there is a genuine fear that people are going to be detained , right? One of the people I spoke to , um , actually had to speak over the phone because she's not leaving her house. She doesn't want to risk , uh , driving through a border checkpoint or anything like that because she does not have status right now. Um , and , yeah , these are people. One of the folks I talked to. She works at the DA's office on very sensitive cases. Domestic violence , child abuse. They don't have that person in that office anymore. Right. The entire region takes a hit because folks who have been following the rules , doing what they're supposed to through no fault of their own , through these administrative delays , are unable to work. Hmm.

S1: Hmm. Well , I want to talk more about , um , the people you met in your reporting , one of them being Rosario , who has been in the DACA program for 14 years. What is she going through right now?

S2: Yeah , She's the woman I alluded to. Yeah. Um , worked at the DA's office. Does not have a job right now. Mm. She's taking care of children right now. The one of her children is , uh , active duty US Army. And that child is having to help out the family now , so that's stress. They're all U.S. citizens. So it just really undermines , uh , and really underscores the situation here. And you can hear directly from her. Like I said , she's not leaving the house. So we talked through a phone. And you can kind of hear that in.

S3: I don't think that this is fair for a family that we're trying so hard to stay here and work hard , because that's what we're here for , to work , to be good citizens , to be an example that we could live here with no issues at all.

S1: And you met with her lawyer. What else did he tell you? All of this , you know , affecting clients?

S2: Well , this is happening to multiple people. And I think what makes this , um , such a frustrating case is that you hear it in her clip , right? You hear the frustration with somebody just trying to do it the right way. Uh , they love this country. She raised a daughter who is serving the country right now. Right. They're on board. They're 100% dialed in to the American experience. But she can't realize that because of of how this administration is handling the immigration process.

S1: Well , and you also spoke with Marcella , Marcella and Zola , uh , a San Diego based immigration lawyer. What are her clients experiencing? Yeah.

S2: Yeah. Similar things. She had a really unique perspective because she's been practicing immigration law since before DACA was a thing. So she's seen the entire existence of DACA. And she views this as she views this episode almost as , um , as a violation of that promise that was darker , right? We're going to give you all the opportunity to fulfill your future and be kind of quasi American in a way that's being taken away from people who have grown up and lived with. With this program , here's what she had to say.

S4: At this point. These kids , and they're not kids. They're all grown now , parents and business owners. Right? Is that they already are established in this community. They are more American than they are. Whatever their first , you know , their birth country is.

S1: So with the threat of losing their status , what options are DACA recipients left with?

S2: Not many. Right. That's why they have DACA. If they had other options to adjust their status they would have taken those right. But unfortunately one of the you hear this over and over again from from representatives , advocates , lawyers on both sides of the aisle that the immigration system is broken. Part of it being broken is that we don't have a legal way for some of these folks in DACA to become temporary or permanent residents. That just doesn't exist for a lot of these folks. So the option is and what some of the lawyers I talked to are suggesting apply eight months before , apply a year before the expiration , just to make sure you can do that. But that does have financial , you know , consequences , right? Because you'd be , like I said , Dhaka last two years , if you apply a year out , you don't get more time , right. You're basically eliminating half the time. So instead of paying more than $600 every two years , you would just pay it one year to ensure that you stay compliant , which is a bit of a solution , but not really a sustainable or a fair one.

S1: How has this administration's policies just more broadly affected DACA recipients?

S2: Yeah , the and this isn't. These administrative delays are not limited to DACA recipients. Lawyers I talked to are seeing it in other types of visa like UVs or TVs. Different types of adjustment of status. Let's say you're permanent , like you're you're on a work visa , you marry a US citizen , you have to adjust that status. People are waiting. So these delays are across the board. Um , I think it's just one example of many. Right? You look at the totality of the administration's immigration policies and they communicate. We want to limit immigration. We want to stop and slow down. Definitely illegal , but also legal immigration as well. If you look at the refugee system where which is a legal way to come into the country , we're kind of shut it down for most people. Right? So they see this whether you have DACA or you're undocumented or you're some other kind of precarious status , they see this as a reason to be concerned , a reason to be overlooking your shoulder and never really being fully comfortable or welcomed in this country. Hmm.

S1: Hmm. How does what's happening compare to public support for DACA.

S2: Yeah that's a really interesting bit of information and something I really wanted to add to this story. Right. Because a lot of these times these issues are framed as you know half the country thinks one thing , half the country things the other. But Gallup has been polling on this issue for a long time and year after year support for DACA recipients. Right. People who were brought in as children have no criminal record , uh , have contributed to this country through education or work or raising children. Most of the country agrees that they should have access to a legal pathway to citizenship. I believe the Gallup data , the latest one , shows over 80% of the country agreeing on this , and it breaks it down by , uh , you know , political preference as well. When it came to Republicans , over 70% of Republicans support a program for this group of people to give them access to citizenship. So when you talk about 8020 issues , right. This is something the majority of this country supports these people. I think the majority of the country , they may know them. Half a million people have duck and they see them at work in their children's schools just interacting in the community. And the polling shows overwhelming support. But still , decades after the Obama administration introduced us to DACA , we have no really long term way for that to happen yet.

S1: Um , right. Well , we're having this conversation , you know , as Donald Trump calls for Ice to continue traffic stops. Uh , of course , the agency called for a pause in stops yesterday following two deadly shootings in less than a week. How does your reporting on DACA recipients fit into the overall picture here of immigration enforcement right now?

S2: There's the reason You know , Rosario , the woman we heard from isn't leaving her house , right? So it was like a snowball effect. One issue could impact you directly , but other issues could impact you indirectly. But it just contributes to this mood , this atmosphere , this tension. I know U.S. citizens , naturalized U.S. citizens who , because of the color of their skin or the accent , they walk around with their passport. Right. So this is impacting U.S. citizens , naturalized U.S. citizens , um , children. There are millions of U.S. citizen children who have at least one parent who is undocumented. And we've reported on it before. You know , they are showing really high levels of stress and anxiety because of that. So all of these policies just contribute to to that just feeling of unease. Hmm.

S1: Hmm. Well , you know , I , I well , I have you here. Um , I do want to shift gears a bit and talk about another recent story of yours. You visited the Otay Mesa Detention Center. Um , tell me about that. What were you doing there?

S2: Yeah , that that was , uh , World Cup. I don't know if you would have expected that that answer , but. Yeah , I heard last week I've heard from a couple of immigration lawyers about this , and it's kind of rare to hear from an immigration lawyer telling you something positive about a detainee. Right. Because it's not a nice place to be at. Right. Detainees are held indefinitely. For months right now. I've talked to some who have been there for a year. More than 20 have died in detention so far this year. It's on pace to be a new record. There are 60,000 people in detention centers. Some of them are over capacity and that's resulting in dangerous conditions. But the World Cup has been one rare source of joy in this place. Right. And we did a story about people at the Otay Mesa Detention Center. watching World Cup games and finding community through World Cup games. They have four TVs there , they all gather and they're just following the tournament as a welcome distraction from their life in detention. Wow.

S1: Wow. All right. Well , we always love your reporting. Thanks for all that you do. I've been speaking with Gustavo Solis. He's investigative border reporter with KPBS. You can find his reporting at KPBS. Gustavo , thanks as always. Yeah.

S2: Yeah. Thank you. Jade.

S1: That's our show for today. I'm your host , Jade Hindman. Thanks for tuning in to Midday Edition. Be sure to have a great day on purpose , everyone.