Sept. 13, 2023
Carson City, NV – Today, Attorney General Ford released the following statement after Judge Andrew Hanen of the Southern District of Texas struck down the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program for future recipients. For more than ten years, DACA has protected undocumented immigrants brought to the United States in their youth from being ripped from what is often the only home they have ever known. While this ruling keeps DACA protections in place for those who currently benefit from the program, it would stop future applicants from being able to make use of it.
“This is the latest in a long string of back-and-forth legal decisions that have kept the future of the DACA program and the program’s recipients in doubt,” said AG Ford. “While I am relieved that the decision allows current DACA recipients to remain protected, I am disappointed at the shortsighted and harmful decision to block these protections for future youth who have known the United States as their home. I am tired and I am sad that this fight is still ongoing, but as long as there are those who seek to attack members of our community and to single them out as non-Americans, I will be there to fight back every step of the way.”
Since 2012, DACA has protected approximately 825,000 individuals who grew up in this country from deportation. Most of the recipients have known no home other than the United States. DACA has enabled hundreds of thousands of grantees to enroll in colleges and universities; start local businesses; and give back to their communities as teachers, medical professionals, engineers and entrepreneurs.
AG Ford has long fought back against efforts to end DACA protections by working with multistate coalitions and leading efforts against the Trump administration’s attempts to dismantle the program. In 2019, AG Ford led a coalition of states in filing a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court urging the court to protect DACA in a case that ultimately led to the court’s protection of the program.
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