Monday, Dec. 4, 2017 | Indiana Daily Student | idsnews.com
IDS
Dreamers deferred
Top left Jesus Bazan is a senior studying microbiology and neuroscience at IU. Bazan was 5 years old when he came from San Miguel, Michoacán, Mexico, to the United States. Top right Sandy Rivera, a junior at IUPUI, is originally from Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Mexico. She was brought to the United States when she was 4 years old. Middle left Maria Chavez Juarez, a sophomore at IUPUI, is from San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato. Middle right Kemberly Hernandez, a sophomore at IUPUI, came to Indianapolis at age 4 from Juarez, Mexico. Now 19, she’s the president of IUPUI’s Latino Student Association. Bottom left Prisma Lopez-Marin, 27, reflects on her many happy memories at La Casa, the Latino Cultural Center. Bottom right Jessie Wang, originally from Taiwan, started her freshman year at IU at age 28, studying law and public policy.
Undocumented immigrant children brought to the United States by their parents often spend their lives searching for stability. With the repeal of DACA, which gave them the chance to go to college and find jobs, many of these dreamers’ doors to a better life might close. Story by Sarah Gardner gardnese@umail.iu.edu | @sarahhhgardner
Photos by Emma Knutson egknutso@umail.iu.edu | @emmaknutson
Multimedia by Rachel Goodman rachgood@umail.iu.edu | @rachela_goodman
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hat Tuesday started like any other. Maria Chavez Juarez sat in her criminology class, Sandy Rivera in her astronomy lecture and Kemberly Hernandez in the IUPUI Campus Center building. But soon Maria’s phone, tucked between her legs, buzzed with message after message. She peeked at the Snapchat messages, and she wasn’t listening to her professor anymore. The President of the United States had sent out a tweet into the world: “Congress, get ready to do your job - DACA!” And then the news came through that September day. The United States government would do exactly what all three of them, as well as hundreds of thousands of students like them around the country, had feared. The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was ending. The newscasts finished. Classes ended. Maria, Sandy and Kemberly walked straight to the Latino Student Association office. The straps of Maria’s backpack felt ten times heavier than they had that morning. Kemberly saw the slogans on a public whiteboard on campus — “build a wall,” “send them back” — that someone wrote in August and never erased. Sandy knew she wouldn’t go to the rest of her classes that day. The three of them found each oth-
er in the LSA office. DACA, the reason they had plans for their futures, the reason they could take astronomy and criminology classes and hang out in the Campus Center at all, the reason they met each other at IUPUI, was over. They looked at each other and didn’t say a word. Maria, Sandy and Kemberly weren’t surprised by the announcement. But whether the news was expected didn’t matter then. They stood silently together, hugging each other tightly, and cried. * * * The status of DACA recipients — often called “Dreamers” — was never certain in its short history. The program began accepting applications in 2012 from undocumented young people brought to the U.S. by their families. It provided protection from deportation orders, a work authorization card and information for Social Security applications, which gave them the opportunity to work and study in the U.S. It made no sense, then-President Barack Obama said, to deport hardworking young people to countries they might not remember. The act met immediate backlash, especially from conservative leaders. Sen. Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa, called it “an affront to the process of representative government.” Those who agreed have been trying to eradicate the law from the moment it was signed. In 2012, 10 Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents filed a suit in the northern Texas federal district court opposing DACA. The lawsuit was dismissed.
In 2013, most Republicans and three Democrats in the House of Representatives voted to defund DACA. That decision was never signed into law. In 2014, Obama attempted to expand DACA to allow more people to become eligible. Twenty-six states sued in federal court, and the expansion was halted. So when the end of DACA was announced by President Trump’s administration that Tuesday in September, it didn’t come as much of a surprise. The lives and futures of DACA kids have always stood on shifting sand. Now even that unstable ground is gone. * * * Burnt orange and bright yellow buildings. Colorful mosaics on the walls. A garden overflowing with plants. The beautiful church down the road. She was only 6 when she left, but Maria Chavez Juarez can still remember San Miguel de Allende. She can remember when she left, too, when her mother told her to put on her best clothes, because they were going to a party. She wore socks with lace hems. Maria, her mother and two of her siblings were driven to the United States-Mexico border. They jumped a fence and crossed the Rio Grande at night. Maria’s socks were covered in burrs. Someone carried her. A snake tried to jump up at them. The sound of cicadas seemed deafening. Her mother told her to pray. Maria’s father had been working in Indianapolis for years, moving between the U.S. and Mexico. When they
More on idsnews.com For videos, interactive graphics and more, see specials.idsnews.com/daca. came to meet him in the U.S., they wouldn’t go back. For years, Maria wished they would. Another brother and sister were still in Mexico because they had jobs and families of their own. Maria hasn’t seen her oldest sister in 13 years. And life in San Miguel, from what she remembered, was warm and colorful and slower-paced than in the U.S. Her parents couldn’t help her with homework because their English wasn’t strong enough, and she was too shy to ask her teachers. She was far ahead of her classmates in math skills, but nobody seemed to notice. She didn’t want to apply for DACA. Maria wanted to go home. When she started college, Maria majored in tourism management. There was a lot of tourism business in Mexico, she thought as she signed up for classes. Maybe this could take her home. “I eventually realized, though, that Mexico probably isn’t like how I remember it,” Maria said. “A family friend visited a few years ago. He said things are very different now, and so maybe it’s better to stay here.” Maria began to imagine a future here. She changed her major to criminal justice. She started researching master’s degree programs. She spent too much money going out to eat with SEE DREAMERS, PAGE 2