NOW IS THE TIME TO TURN THE DREAM ACT INTO A REALITY!!
CALL YOUR U.S. SENATORS AND U.S. REPRESENTATIVE TODAY AND TELL HIM OR HER TO MOVE ON THE DREAM ACT DURING THE LAME DUCK SESSION!
LOS ANGELES, CA – For the last decade, MALDEF and other organizations nationwide have pushed to make the DREAM Act (the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act) into a reality. With your help, we can achieve a long-awaited victory and ensure a path to citizenship for thousands of immigrant youth and young adults seeking to obtain a college degree or to serve in the U.S. Military.
How Can You Help?
Call your respective senators and house member to tell them to call the DREAM Act for a vote before the end of this Congress, this year! We need your help to make sure that each elected member understands the support for this bill. As early as this week, Senator Reid will seek to bring the DREAM Act for a vote on the Senate floor. House leaders, including the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, have also stated it is time to vote on the DREAM Act.
How Will Calling Your Senators and House Representative Help?
Your call will help the Senate and House understand the broad support for the DREAM Act. Every Senate and House office needs to hear from supporters like you. Rest assured, opponents of the DREAM Act are doing everything they can to stop this bill. We must match them call for call and ensure that the DREAM Act becomes law.
The vote will need 60 Senators voting in favor. The vote in the House will need a simple majority.
URGENT CALL TO ACTION:
- Dial: 1-888-254-5087. Ask for one of your home state Senators and U.S. Representative and leave a message with their office. Call back and ask for the other Senator and then again for your member of the House of Representatives.
- If you can't get through, keep trying!
CALLED ALL OFFICES THAT REPRESENT YOU IN CONGRESS?
CALL AGAIN AND HAVE YOUR FRIENDS & FAMILY DO THE SAME!
What is the DREAM Act?
For close to ten years, bipartisan leaders have repeatedly introduced different versions of the DREAM Act before Congress. Earlier this year, the Migration Policy Institute estimated that roughly 825,000 immigrants would benefit from the Act. According to recent research from UCLA, a conservative estimate of the combined income generated by those benefiting from the DREAM Act would amount to $1.4 trillion (in current dollars) over the next four decades.
The DREAM Act would help provide a path to citizenship otherwise not available to immigrant youth and young adults, particularly those completing two years of college or military service. Key criteria for a young person to qualify for conditional relief and eventually permanent relief include:
- entry into the U.S. before the age of 16;
- presence in the U.S. for five consecutive years;
- completion of high school (through graduation or G.E.D.) or acceptance into college;
- being between 12 and 35 years of age at the time of application; and
- establishment of "good moral character" as defined under immigration law.
If Congress passes the DREAM Act, President Obama will sign it into law.
For all media inquiries, please contact Laura Rodriguez.
