DACA recipients in Sonoma County happy after Supreme Court ruling but say there’s more work to be done

Petaluma resident Gricelda Correa began her morning last Thursday as she usually does — reaching for her phone as soon as she woke, scrolling through her Facebook page to see her friends’ latest posts.

It didn’t take long before her screen was filled with news of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision rejecting President Donald Trump’s attempt to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program, which has shielded her from deportation since she first applied in 2012.

Known as DACA, the immigration policy created eight years ago by President Barack Obama’s administration gives undocumented citizens brought to the United States as children a two-year reprieve from deportation under certain circumstances, as well as the ability to legally work and apply for a driver’s license.

In a 5-4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that Trump’s 2017 attempt to end the program was not executed correctly, though the court’s decision did not bar his administration from making a second attempt.

“For the most part, I was happy,” Correa, 29, said of her reaction to the court’s ruling. “But I was also rooted in the reality that this is still a temporary program.”

Correa joins several local beneficiaries of the program and immigration advocates who took a moment to celebrate Thursday’s decision, which they considered a victory against Trump and his administration’s attempts to restrict the rights of immigrants living in the United States. Still, many said there’s more work to be done to cement protections created by the 2012 program, one that has opened many doors to success that were not previously available.

“I told people, I’m glad you’re celebrating but let’s just remember that we have to have more of a voice for advocacy,” said Correa, who posted a live video on Facebook with a similar message on the day of the ruling.

Richard Coshnear, an immigration attorney who manages a local immigration advocacy group called VIDAS, said the ruling was of particular impact for undocumented residents living in the U.S. who qualified for the program but had not yet applied before Trump ordered its cancellation, and those who were too young to apply prior to 2017. Applicants must be at least 15 years old.

Individuals already admitted to the DACA program prior to Trump’s executive order were still able to apply for renewals as the issue moved to the Supreme Court, though new applications were not allowed during that time, he said.

But applicants, who are often called Dreamers after never-passed Congressional proposals known as the DREAM Act, may be hesitant to apply for DACA for the first time because of concerns about how their information will be handled by the federal agency that processes the applications, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which is overseen by the same department that operates the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

There’s also uncertainty over how the November election might impact a second attempt by Trump to end DACA, a process that experts say would take at least several months if done correctly but could continue without interruption if Trump wins another term.

“You have to weigh giving (the federal agency) that information for the first time versus getting a work permit for the first time,” Coshnear said. “It kind of depends on the timing on how this all unfolds. If Trump acts quickly to cancel DACA, people may not win a lot.”

Rafael Vasquez, an adviser for Santa Rosa Junior College’s M.E.Ch.A organization and the organizer of the informational Facebook page DACA Sonoma County, said he and a group of volunteers that has offered free help with DACA applications since 2012 has received an influx of people interested applying for the federal program.

So far, the group has identified more than two dozen people who meet the program’s criteria and plan to meet with them in the coming weeks to fill out and collect the required paperwork, a tedious and sometimes lengthy process.

Many of the prospective DACA recipients are in high school and almost all are first-time applicants, Vasquez said.

“The reality is some of them, in two weeks, will have everything but some of them, it will take some time to get this sorted,” Vasquez said.

Correa described her acceptance into the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program eight years ago as being offered an "opportunity that a lot of my peers take for granted.“

She was able to afford a college education and traded a string of odd jobs for a full-time career with the work permit and Social Security number she received through the DACA program. She no longer had to worry about ICE showing up at her front door or driving without a license as long as she renewed her application every two years at a cost of nearly $500 each time.

“I know that my chances and opportunities here are going to be better if I have a Social Security number and am protected from deportation for two years,” Correa said.

For Alondra Ortiz, 22, the acceptance of her DACA application when she turned 16 has allowed her to gain better employment opportunities, which helped her family while she was in high school and now supports her and her son. She had anxiously awaited the result of the Supreme Court’s decision on the DACA program.

“Without my work permit, my job would just fire me,” Ortiz said. “I would not have any source of income.”

Javier, a Sonoma State University student who asked to be identified only by his first name because of his legal status, said he arrived in the U.S. in 2010, which was too late to qualify for DACA.

Without the legal protections afforded to approved applicants, he’s not been able to qualify for federal or state funds to pay for college and has had to work extra hard to cover school expenses with private scholarships. He plans to apply to doctorate programs in the fall, though is unsure what the future will hold after he’s finished his education.

“At the end of the day, if I don’t get a Social Security number or a work permit, I’m stranded,” Javier said.

You can reach Staff Writer Nashelly Chavez at 707-521-5203 or nashelly.chavez@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @nashellytweets