DREAMers Demand Prez Stop Deportations

Jesslyn and Suidy Jimenez held up photos of their mother Gladys Jimenez Vasquez, currently detained in Houston, as they joined dozens of others rallying for executive action on immigration reform.

They and other local immigrant and union leaders met U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal at New Haven City Hall Thursday afternoon to call for President Barack Obama to use his executive powers to stop deportations and bring back the 2 two million people deported during his presidency.

DREAMers (a name taken from state and federal versions of the DREAM, or Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors, Act) shared personal stories describing how they benefited from past federal laws, and asked for those policies to be expanded for more immigrants.

Since the Republican party took control of Congress Tuesday, Blumenthal said, the pressure on the president to act independently of Congress is even greater.

The rally was an ​“opportunity to ask the president to take big, bold steps … that will make [immigration laws] fairer and more effective,” Blumenthal said. ​“He can permit deferral for parents of U.S. citizens to keep families together.”

Kica Matos, director of immigrant rights and racial justice at the Center for Community Change, said Blumenthal is the ​“first senator in the country since the election to urge the president to do the right thing.”

After coming to the country from Peru as a 5‑year-old, Maria Praeli is one of many who benefited from a 2012 federal law deferring deportation for immigrants who came as children (who are often referred to as DREAMers. Although she now has a driver’s license and job due to that law, she spoke on behalf of her mother Chela, who still lives in fear of being sent back to Peru.

Maria Praeli teared up as she brought her mother up to the podium. ​“Even though I have [Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA)], I can’t live peacefully knowing that …my mother could be deported,” she said. ​“The thought of her being taken away from me is unbearable.”

Carolina Bortolleto, with the group Connecticut Students for a DREAM, also benefited from DACA as an immigrant to Danbury from Brazil 16 years ago. She said her mom leaves the house daily to work as a maid, scared that she will not be allowed to return.

Bortolleto called for “administrative relief that is as bold, broad and inclusive as possible.”

The president has the authority make decisions on arrests, detainments and deportations, said Yale Law professor Michael Wishnie. “Tomorrow, he could release from immigration prisons around the country thousands of detainees ... he could use statutory parole powers to bring home the 2 million that have been deported.”

Blumenthal followed to add: “Use of power is not abuse of power. Responsible use of power is what the president takes the oath to do.”

President Obama signaled on Wednesday that he may indeed use his executive powers, now that the election is over, to carry out some of what the speakers in New Haven Thursday are urging him to do. Read about that here.