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Attorney General Janet Mills urges support for ?Dreamers?
September 5, 2017
OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Andrew Roth-Wells
Date: September 5, 2017 Telephone: (207) 626-8887
Attorney General Janet Mills urges support for ?Dreamers?
Mills joins bipartisan outcry opposing Trump Administration?s announcement that they will end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program
AUGUSTA ? Maine Attorney General Janet Mills condemned efforts by the Trump Administration to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program (DACA). Mills joined a bipartisan outcry of public officials, business owners, and community leaders across the nation in decrying today?s announcement by U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions that the Trump Administration will accept no new applications from children of immigrant families and will end the program entirely in 6 months.
?The several hundred young people in Maine who will be directly impacted by this action are working and paying taxes to the state,? said Mills. ?They are serving in our military and defending our country, volunteering in our communities, attending our schools and contributing to our economy. The idea that these are the people the current administration wants to remove from the only country they?ve ever know is despicable.?
Since 2012, nearly 800,000 young immigrants who were brought to this country as children have been granted DACA status after completing applications, passing a background check, and applying for a work permit. Many of these young adults who have been granted DACA status, are soldiers, college graduates, nurses and first responders.
In July Mills joined 19 other Attorney Generals in a letter to President Trump urging him to maintain DACA.
According to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, more than 400 hundred individuals have been approved under DACA in Maine and nearly all of them are gainfully employed. If DACA is rescinded, Maine stands to lose an estimated $4 million in our annual gross domestic product.
?At this time when hundreds of employers are struggling to hire workers and keep their businesses open, DACA is important to our state?s economy as well as being a basic humanitarian measure.?
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