WASHINGTON -- A District of Columbia federal judge has delivered the toughest blow yet to efforts by President Donald Trump's administration to end deportation protections for young illegal aliens, ordering the government to continue the program and -- for the first time since announcing it would end -- reopen it to new applicants.
U.S. District Judge John Bates on Tuesday called the government's decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program "virtually unexplained" and therefore "unlawful." However, he stayed his ruling for 90 days to give the Department of Homeland Security a chance to provide more solid reasoning for ending the program.
Bates is the third judge to rule against Trump administration attempts to rescind the deferred-action program, which provides two-year, renewable work permits and deportation protections for nearly 800,000 illegal aliens brought to the country as children.
In his ruling, Bates said the decision to phase out the program starting in March "was arbitrary and capricious because the Department failed adequately to explain its conclusion that the program was unlawful."
"Each day that the agency delays is a day that aliens who might otherwise be eligible for initial grants of DACA benefits are exposed to removal because of an unlawful agency action," Bates wrote, referring to the deferred-action program by its initials.
Federal judges in California and New York have also blocked the administration's plans on those grounds, and ordered the administration to renew work permits for immigrants enrolled in the program.
But the ruling by Bates, an appointee of President George W. Bush, is far more expansive: If the government does not come up with a better explanation within 90 days, he will rescind the government memo that terminated the program and require the Homeland Security Department to enroll new applicants, as well. Thousands could be eligible to apply.
"We are pleased and gratified ... but we're not out of the woods yet," said Bradford Berry, general counsel for the NAACP, a plaintiff in one of the two lawsuits that triggered the ruling.
The Trump administration said it is reviewing the decision. In a statement, the Justice Department pointed out that a similar program, one for immigrant parents that was also introduced under President Barack Obama, failed to survive a court challenge, and said ending the deferred-action program was part of its efforts to protect the border and enforce the rule of law.
"Today's order doesn't change the Department of Justice's position on the facts: DACA was implemented unilaterally after Congress declined to extend benefits to this same group of illegal aliens," spokesman Devin O'Malley said in a statement. "The Justice Department will continue to vigorously defend this position."
A Section on 04/25/2018