President-elect Donald Trump has promised to deport millions of people once he enters office. Many so-called Dreamers, people who were brought to America illegally as children but were later granted protection, are now scared they too will have to leave.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Daniel was born in Mexico.
00:03He was just a baby when his family came to Texas.
00:07He grew up living in fear.
00:09Not having papers meant his parents were constantly scared of being deported if they had even
00:14the slightest problem with the authorities.
00:17He only told a few friends, people he knew were undocumented too.
00:22When Daniel was 16, he became a recipient of DACA, the program which gives some limited
00:27protection to undocumented immigrants who arrived as children.
00:31It took away that fear and meant he could study.
00:34He's channeling his passion for immigrant advocacy and policy reform into a degree in
00:39political science at the University of Texas in Dallas.
00:44I talk about it because I want to hopefully, you know, I want one kid walking down the
00:48street who is also undocumented to hear, oh, that guy's also like undocumented, it's like,
00:53I can do, maybe like if he's doing such things, maybe I can do that.
00:58Many scared dreamers demonstrated against Donald Trump's attempt to end the DACA program
01:03in his first term as president.
01:06To their relief, the Supreme Court blocked that attempt.
01:12This time around, Daniel feels more empowered.
01:16But one thing that really kept me from like kind of going down that rabbit hole was the
01:20fact that I saw so many people, so many people from the immigrant community come together
01:25and say, you know, we made it to the first time, we're going to, you know, survive the
01:30second time around.
01:32He's working as an intern at Legal Aid DC, a group that gives legal assistance to low-income immigrants.
01:39He's the best example of why we need to fix our broken system.
01:43Rarely do we have undergrad interns, but Daniel was so extraordinary.
01:47His passion and knowledge for someone so young on immigration policy was so impressive.
01:54They're preparing for worrying times and expect many people will come to them for advice.
01:59We anticipate, based on my experience in the past, we anticipate there'll likely be a spike
02:05in December, January and throughout the next couple of years.
02:08We are a country of immigrants and our role at Legal Aid, just, you know, my ethos is
02:13that we're going to just make sure that everyone can pursue the protections they're entitled
02:19to because everyone should feel welcome here.
02:23Daniel hopes to see a shift in how migration is usually discussed in the U.S. towards acceptance.
02:30You'd be surprised every, you'd see them everywhere you go, whether it be construction, working
02:35in your favorite restaurants, going to school with you.
02:41There are people like me everywhere.
02:45Those people can only hope that DACA protection will remain so they don't have to live in
02:49fear like he used to.