On Tuesday, a panel of three California appeals court judges requested that the federal government give better reasons for their decision to close the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that protects from the threat of deportation undocumented immigrants who came to the US as minors.
The 9th Circuit US Court of Appeals has to rule on whether the injunction forcing the government to maintain the deferred action program, delivered by a lower court, should stay in place across the US while legal challenges to the decision continue. The Trump administration announced last September that the 2012 program, initiated by President Barack Obama, would close down, challenging Congress to create a legislative solution.
In January, San Francisco US District Judge, William Alsup, issued the injunction against the termination of the program, following the decision to sue the administration by several plaintiffs. These included the University of California, which has many DACA recipients, known as ‘Dreamers’, enrolled at its establishments. A Brooklyn-based judge came to a similar decision, and a Washington judge decided to give the government extra time to explain its reasoning for ending the program.
US Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, has claimed that the program was unlawful, an argument that government attorneys were asked to clarify by the appeals court judges on Tuesday. The fate of the deferred action program is at the government’s discretion to decide, according to Hashim Mooppan, the Deputy Assistant Attorney General.