MALDEF STATEMENT ON DHS' DECISION TO RESCIND DAPA

MALDEF

June 15, 2017

Los Angeles, CA - Please attribute the following statement on the U.S Department of Homeland Security’s memo rescinding Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA) to MALDEF President and General Counsel Thomas A. Saenz:

"Demonstrating its characteristic obtuseness with respect to civil rights history, the Trump Administration chose the 35th anniversary of the Supreme Court ruling in Plyler v. Doe, a singular achievement for immigrants' rights, as the day to rescind the 2014 initiative of Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA), which would protect from removal millions of immigrant parents raising children in the U.S.

Although DAPA has been barred from implementation by the injunction issued in an unsupportable legal action filed by Texas and two dozen other states, the withdrawal of DAPA has symbolic importance, and Secretary Kelly could have acted on another day.

One positive aspect of the elimination of DAPA is that the wholly politicized Texas litigation against DAPA is now moot, so the case of Texas v. United States should be swiftly dismissed. Dismissal would end what has become a collusive action between parties who take the same position on DAPA."

Read the memo HERE

Founded in 1968, MALDEF is the nation's leading Latino legal civil rights organization. Often described as the "Latino Legal Voice for Civil Rights in America" MALDEF promotes social change through advocacy, communications, community education, and litigation in the areas of education, employment, immigrant rights, and political access. For more information on MALDEF, please visit: www.maldef.org.