Following a long-established pattern of initiating federal policies hostile to immigrants, the Trump regime in an unannounced policy change, eliminated a “deferred action” program in August that had allowed immigrants to avoid deportation while they or their relatives were undergoing lifesaving medical treatment.
Immigrants and their families were notified by letter dated Aug. 7 that they must leave the country within 33 days of receipt or face deportation. For many immigrants, this means they would no longer have access to critical medical care, which physicians caring for patients suffering from cancer, cystic fibrosis and other serious conditions, including many children, say would be a certain death sentence.
After news reports uncovered the repeal of the deferred action program, physicians, patient advocates, human rights activists and politicians expressed their outrage at the Trump regime’s latest and perhaps most inhumane policy. Reacting to the criticism, USCIS the agency that sent out the letter ordering severely ill patients to leave the country, appeared to backtrack, saying that pending cases would now be re-opened, but did not say whether it would continue to grant immigrants extensions to remain in the U.S., or whether the program would be terminated as originally planned. Between The Lines’ Scott Harris spoke with Thomas A. Saenz, president and general counsel with the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, who assesses the latest Trump action targeting immigrants, and what can be done to effectively resist these callous policies.
THOMAS A. SAENZ: Well, I think this is a particularly heartless change in long-standing practice, but it is of a piece with the many inhumane policy changes we’ve seen from this administration. Whether that’s the public charge regulations which will drive far too many folks from receiving services to which they are entitled – lifesaving services in many cases, to the recent regulations changing or attempting to change, rather, the Flores settlement to allow the administration to cage children and their mothers for longer than three weeks and in some cases indefinitely. We’ve also seen attempts to take housing away from families that include an undocumented member. We’ve seen changes in our asylum, both substance and process, in a manner that will threaten the lives of those who go through many travails to to reach our country, seeking to leave what are unquestionably very dire and threatening conditions in their home countries. But a lot of what this administration has done from day one is to create uncertainty. And from that uncertainty, great fear in the minds of immigrants, both immigrants approaching the United States and immigrants who have been here in some cases for decades. And creating that uncertainty and fear has consequences. It has consequences on children who live in daily fear for their parents and their families. It has consequences on adults who don’t have good indications of what it is they can and should do to continue to ensure that their families can thrive and survive in the United States.
BETWEEN THE LINES: What’s the current status of this Trump administration effort to deport children who are dependent on very intensive medical care to stay alive? What’s going on right now as as you understand it?
THOMAS A. SAENZ: Well, as I understand it, there has been a stated change. But implementation of that change is still a question mark and I hope that it can be resolved in a way that would change that stated change. We have seen that before, of course, and the zero tolerance policy in the separation of children from their parents still happens, but not in the same magnitude of numbers that it did after when it was getting the public attention that it was receiving. Perhaps the heartlessness of this latest change is something that could lead to a backlash and a retreat from the administration. We certainly have seen retreats from this administration despite the president’s rhetoric to the contrary. When the public is indignant enough and speaks loudly enough often with the supportive media, then we have seen this administration choose to abandon some of its worst initiatives. There also will of course, be court action, no question, as there has been with respect to so many of the unwarranted changes being made by this administration. And as you know, in many of those cases, the federal courts have stepped in to prevent the continued implementation or even stop the initial implementation of some of these really inhumane changes being contemplated and announced and attempted to be implemented by this administration.
BETWEEN THE LINES: In your mind, what can Congress or what should Congress be doing at this moment as the Trump administration was caught with this policy exposed by the media?
THOMAS A. SAENZ: Well, the Congress always has the authority to override a decision by the administration. It has the authority to override regulations through resolution. Now that resolution is subject to a veto by Trump. But if enough of members of the House and the Senate believe strongly in overriding a regulation, they can override that veto. And Congress has the legislative authority to change whatever the laws are that apply in a particular circumstance to one that it considers to be more humane, more consistent with Congress’ own long-standing intent, and frankly more consistent with the principles that our country operates on.
So it’s certainly appropriate to blame the Trump administration, to blame the president, to blame Stephen Miller for some of these inhumane regulatory and other policy changes. But we also have to remember that Congress is accountable. And in particular, the U.S. Senate that refuses to act on anything approaching a rebuke of this president really should be held accountable for all of the inhumanity that now pervades certainly our immigration policy. But as you know, so many other areas of policy as well.
For more information on the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, visit MALDEF.org.
