Dreamers Protest Brewer’s Order to deny deferred action benefits
By Griselda Nevárez, Voxxi
“Her act yesterday is seen as an attack on dreamers, because it’s going to restrict them so much,” Debbie Robles, a United States citizen and a student at Arizona State University, told a Brewer spokesman.
Robles also cited a poll released by the Merrill/Morrison Institute in April that found nearly three-quarters of Arizona registered voters are in favor of legislation, such as the DREAM Act, that would create a path to citizenship for undocumented young immigrants who meet some of the same criteria required to apply for deferred action.
Brewer did not come out to speak with undocumented youth and their supporters. Instead, Matthew Benson, a spokesman for the governor, met with them. He defended Brewer’s executive order saying it doesn’t stop President Barack Obama‘s federal program from moving forward and that it only reinforces state laws.
“Gov. Brewer has taken an oath to uphold the law and that includes all the laws,” he said. “There are existing state laws in Arizona that forbid individuals who are not citizens from consuming public benefits. There are also laws that forbid non-citizens from receiving drivers’ licenses.”
Robles responded to Benson’s comment saying that by issuing the order, Brewer showed she is opposed to having a conversation about how to integrate undocumented young immigrants into society. She asked that the governor cooperate with dreamers—a term used to describe undocumented youth who entered the country as children—in finding a solution that would allow them to apply for drivers licenses and state-issued identification cards.
Benson replied that he invites state lawmakers to present a bill at the state legislature that would grant such benefits to undocumented youth who qualify for deferred action.
“That’s a debate that we welcome,” he said. “For critics to say that the governor has taken a wrong move and should allow drivers licenses to go forward, they need to bring a bill and put it through the process just like everybody else.”
When the news broke Wednesday afternoon about Brewer’s executive order, lawyers across the state began questioning whether the governor has the authority to deny undocumented youth some of the benefits given to them under deferred action.
Some attorneys told VOXXI the order is lawful but attorneys with the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona think otherwise and plan to challenge it.
Alessandra Soler, executive director of the ACLU’s Arizona chapter, issued a statement Wednesday night saying the governor “is distorting federal law and inaccurately interpreting state law.”
“This order conflicts with state and federal law because people who are granted deferred action will, in fact, have authorized presence in the United States, and under Arizona law people who have authorized presence are eligible to apply for Arizona state identification,” she said.
The governor’s announcement on Wednesday also upset and frustrated many dreamers in Arizona who were eager to apply for the federal program, which also grants them a two-year reprieve from deportation and work authorization. It’s estimated that 80,000 of the 950,000 undocumented youth who currently qualify for deferred action live in Arizona.
Josh Montaño, who has been living in the U.S. since he was 8-months-old, is one of those dreamers. He joined about 20 other undocumented young immigrants and supporters who spent the night outside the State Capitol Wednesday after marching there.
For this 23-year-old graduate of Arizona State University, this is an all too familiar scene. He told VOXXI he recalls people spending the night at the State Capitol when Brewer signed into law Arizona’s immigration law in 2010.
Montaño also remembers spending the night for about a month outside Sen. John McCain’s Phoenix office late 2010 when the DREAM Act was up for a vote in Congress. He and members of the Arizona DREAM Act Coalition were there asking the Republican senator to vote in favor of the bill, which he supported in the past. The DREAM Act died in the U.S. Senate that year after passing in the U.S. House of Representatives.
“It seems like we’re repeating what we’ve already gone through,” he told VOXXI. “But we can’t be moving backwards, we have to move forward.”
Fired up by Gov. Brewer’s executive order, he and dozens of other dreamers canvased Latino neighborhoods Thursday to register voters and encourage them to vote in November for candidates who support the DREAM Act.
“We need to come together and show Brewer that we are going to overcome this,” he said. “The only way we can do that is by getting our community to vote.”
This article was first published in Voxxi.
Griselda Nevárez is a reporter with Hispanic Link News Service in Washington D.C.
[Photo by DonkeyHotey]