VP Kamala Harris’s campaign declined to discuss her policy for Dreamers with Alex Thompson of Axios.Thompson wanted to know if Harris still backs her 2019 pledge “to use presidential power to unilaterally give a path to citizenship to 2 million ‘Dreamers’ — undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children.””The vice president has fought for Dreamers throughout her career and is proud of the actions taken under her and President Biden to expand protections for them, including the executive action President Biden took this year, which she supported,” spokesperson Ian Sams told Axios.The campaign also didn’t say if Harris would support “using ‘parole in place” for any other group of undocumented immigrants.”Bringing up “parole in place” is important because she included a similar plan in her four executive promises.In 2019, Harris promised four executive actions to give two “million Dreamers a path to citizenship and shield more than 6 million undocumented immigrants from deportation.”The four executive actions include creating a “Dreamers Parole-in-Place Program:”
- Harris would reinstate DACA and expand it by extending the two-year protections afforded by DACA to three years, eliminating the rule that Dreamers apply by the time they’re 31, lowering the age below 15 to allow people to apply for protection and by changing the deadline for entry into the U.S.
- She would also create “a deferred action program for parents of citizens or legal permanent residents as well as other law-abiding immigrants with strong ties to their communities,” per a senior campaign official.
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- Another would allow Dreamers to become eligible to apply for legal status — despite the current rule which requires one to have “maintained continuously a lawful status since entry” — because they were brought here through “no fault of [their] own.”
- There is an exception to the rule of maintaining lawful status for immigrants who were unable to do so through “no fault of [their] own,” according to the Immigration and Nationality Act.
- A third executive action would allow Harris to grant the Secretary of Homeland Security the power to “retroactively grant work authorization to Dreamers.”
- The fourth would expand cases of “extreme hardship” by ruling that family separation counts as an “extreme hardship” when immigrants apply for a green card from another country.
- According to a senior campaign aide, the current rule states: “If Dreamers choose to leave the country to apply for legal status, their prior ‘unlawful presence’ in the U.S. bars them from re-entering the country for up to ten years. The DHS Secretary, however, can waive these bars in cases of ‘extreme hardship.'”
The report came out after Charlie Spiering tweeted a video of Harris at a 2018 parade shouting, “Down down with deportation!”
Disgraced actor Jussie Smollett joined her.
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