More than 150 immigration activists held a news conference in front of the White House Tuesday morning, calling the president a “liar” and a “monster” for his apparent decision to end an Obama-era program that shields nearly 800,000 young people from deportation, and vowing to fight to find a way to preserve it.
Trump administration officials are widely expected to announce an end to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program Tuesday, the deadline a Republican coalition had given the president to cancel it, although they may delay enforcement of the decision for six months, according to people familiar with the discussions.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a longtime DACA opponent, is scheduled to make an announcement about the program at the Department of Justice at 11 a.m.
Many outside the White House declared they were undocumented and still unwilling to stay quiet in the lead-up to Sessions’ announcement.
They chanted “shame on you,” sang, clanged cymbals and banged on drums. Signs said, “We are America,” “Congress! Don’t wimp out!” and “We want education, down with deportation.”
“This president lied to the community. For many months, he said, ‘I love the Dreamers.’ He lied to us, we cannot trust him,” said Gustavo Torres, executive director of CASA, an immigration advocacy organization. “We are going to keep fighting, we are going to keep registering people to vote. We are going to win elections in Virginia this year. We are going to win the elections in 2018 and 2020.”
Earlier, at Trinity Lutheran Church in downtown Washington, immigrants and activists preparing for a four-day fast to protest the elimination of DACA said they were stunned that Trump had made Sessions his messenger.
Trump “doesn’t have the guts to confront immigrant youth on this,” said Sheridan Aguirre, 23, field communications manager with United We Dream and a DACA recipient who was brought to the United States from Mexico when he was a year old.
Sessions, he continued, has “been anti-immigrant his entire career. It’s really sickening for him to come out and make the announcement.”
Activists plan to march from the White House in separate groups to the Justice Department, Immigration and Customs Enforcement headquarters and the Trump hotel, then circle back to the White House. Other rallies are planned nationwide.
Supporters of DACA say Tuesday marks a day of reckoning for a president and members of Congress who express sympathy for those brought to the United States illegally as children yet have not passed a law to protect them from deportation.
“They will be put in the position of having to look immigrant youth in the eye and say to these people, who have lived in the United States since they were 1 year old, that we literally want you locked into a detention camp and forced out of this country,” Adam Luna, communications director of United We Dream, said Monday.
President Barack Obama’s initiative cleared the way for young undocumented immigrants to get driver’s licenses and jobs, and to more easily afford college.
But critics say Obama overstepped his authority in creating DACA, and opponents of the program say it wrongly skirts U.S. border restrictions and opens up to undocumented immigrants jobs that should be reserved for legal residents.
A group of Republican elected officials from several states threatened to challenge the program in court if Trump didn’t start to phase it out by Sept. 5.
During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump vowed to end DACA “immediately.” But he later wavered and said he would treat the young beneficiaries “with heart.”
In June, Texas and several other states urged Trump to end the program. The states, which had mounted a successful legal challenge in federal court to a similar program that would have benefited the undocumented parents of U.S. citizens and green-card holders, have until Tuesday to amend that lawsuit to include DACA.
They say their demand that Trump end the program does not require the president to immediately rescind work permits of current DACA recipients or to seek to deport those young people.
Thousands have already rallied to support the program, including some Trump backers. Hundreds of business executives, including ones from Apple and Facebook, are urging Trump and Congress to protect the young immigrants.
The mood was somber in the basement of First Trinity Tuesday morning, as young immigrants and supporters prepared to fast to protest the DACA decision. They ate breakfast quesadillas, drank kale smoothies and played music as a giant fan cooled the air.
Organizers from Mexico, Alabama, Massachusetts and other states vowed to push for a action in Congress to protect DACA recipients and other young immigrants.
Among the 28 people planning to fast was Fernanda Herrera, 22, an aspiring law student from Alabama who crossed the border from Mexico with her mother before her third birthday.
Alabama is one of only two states that bars undocumented students from attending public universities. So Herrera attended the private Samford University in Birmingham, majoring in international relations and relying on scholarship money and what she earned on her own to pay tuition.
Her DACA work permit expires in December, 2018. She had a car accident in August that left her with a broken pelvis and mounting medical bills. She does not have health insurance.
“I have student loans to pay,” Herrera said. “I don´t know how I´m going to do it.”
Read more: Political fight brews as Trump prepares to end program for ‘Dreamers’ Their lives were transformed by DACA. Here’s what happens if it disappears. Pastors who stood by Trump after Charlottesville urged him to show ‘heart’ on DACA
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