As a small-business owner, homeowner and parent in Albin, Cruz Morales has achieved what many would call the Wyoming ideal. But the foundation of the life she’s built could soon crumble with the stroke of a pen in a Texas courtroom.
When Morales arrived as a 15-year-old undocumented immigrant in 2001 with her mother in New Mexico, she was confined to the margins of American life. Having immigrated as a child, however, she qualified for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program when it was created 11 years later. As a DACA recipient she didn’t have to live in the shadows. Instead, she was eligible for a social security card and had the chance to buy a house, open the cleaning and painting businesses she runs with her husband and raise her daughter in Albin.
Established in 2012 by former President Barack Obama, DACA provides eligible immigrants who arrived in the U.S. before their 16th birthday with a renewable two-year immigration status that allows them to study and work legally in the U.S. In 2017 the Trump administration set out to dismantle the policy. A slew of legal challenges ensued, the latest of which awaits resolution in a Texas federal court, leaving DACA’s fate uncertain.
For now, Morales’ DACA status is secure, but new applications are on hold until the court rules. For DACA recipients in Wyoming like Morales, the final outcome is poised to determine their future in the U.S.
“DACA helped me a lot in my life,” Morales said. “It has changed my life a lot.”
Most of her family lives in Wyoming now, Morales said.
“Not until we got to Wyoming, we started seeing progress in our lives,” Morales said.
“You have all this, but you never know if tomorrow everything’s gonna change,” Morales said.
She tries not to think about what might happen if DACA is struck down in court, she said.
Precarious policy
Obama established DACA with an executive order in 2012 after Congress failed to pass the 2010 DREAM Act, legislation intended to establish a permanent citizenship solution for eligible children and young adults. The bill died, but its name lives on in the colloquial term for DACA recipients: “Dreamers.”
Executive orders are impermanent by nature. That left the protections DACA grants the nearly 580,000 participants like Morales vulnerable to Trump’s 2017 repeal of the program. The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2020 reinstatement restored benefits, but the legal push-and-pull and the resulting instability in DACA recipients’ lives is likely to continue until Congress reaches a permanent solution for Dreamers.
The latest legal challenge is taking place in a Texas district court before Judge Andrew Hanen. Nine Republican-led states — Wyoming is not among them — brought a suit against the policy, claiming financial injury by undocumented immigrants, including DACA recipients.
This is the second time the plaintiffs – Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina, West Virginia, Kansas and Mississippi – have challenged the program in Hanen’s court. They succeeded in July 2021 when Hanen first ruled Obama’s original 2012 DACA memo unlawful on procedural and substantive grounds, a decision that was confirmed on Oct. 5 2022 by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.
The Biden administration responded to the appeals decision with a revised version of the original policy that took effect on Oct. 31. 2022. The nine states began the process of challenging the revised policy before it went into effect. Hanen presided over a hearing on Oct. 14 2022, outlining the timeline for a new lawsuit.
As the legal challenges play out, DACA continues to offer protections for those already enrolled. Hanen, however, barred the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from processing first-time applications submitted after his July 2021 ruling. This includes eligible individuals reapplying after a one-year lapse in enrollment.
Morales has been able to maintain her legal status with relative ease, but her niece, who turns 15 this year — the same age Morales was when she arrived in the U.S. — will be unable to acquire DACA protection.
“My sister-in-law is kind of stressed out because she doesn’t know what’s gonna happen when [my niece] finishes high school,” Morales said.” I don’t know. I mean, we don’t have an answer because we actually don’t know what to do.”
The standing DACA policy of the moment allows Morales to continue reapplying for deferred action status, which means she can continue her life as a homeowner, businesswoman and mother in Albin — at least until Hanen’s decision.
“I don’t really know what is going to be the decision,” Morales said. “So I’m trying not to worry about that. If I think about it, it is really hard.”
Cruz morales
His ruling will either uphold the program or strike it down. Either way, experts believe the case is destined for the U.S. Supreme Court. That process will likely take a few years, said Jerry Fowler, assistant law professor and director of the University of Wyoming’s International Human Rights Clinic.
Fowler expects Hanen to rule against the program in a similar manner as his October 2022 decision. If that happens, DACA recipients will retain their protected status until the case reaches the high court.
That would buy current DACA recipients like Morales more time, but no sense of how much.
“I don’t really know what is going to be the decision,” Morales said. “So I’m trying not to worry about that. If I think about it, it is really hard.”
DACA in Wyoming
Though DACA eligibility criteria and baseline protections are federally mandated, access to key benefits varies by state.
This can define the experience of DACA recipients such as Morales looking to advance their careers or achieve higher education.
Her 16-year-old daughter has many more educational and economic opportunities as a U.S. citizen than Morales remembers having, she said.
Instead of finishing high school in New Mexico, Morales completed a GED to focus on working to cover bills and sustain herself.
Once she was awarded DACA in 2012, she became eligible for federal benefits including deferred action on deportation, work permits, a social security number, advanced parole for travel and some federal tax credits.
Though contested, Wyoming permits driver’s licenses and identification cards for DACA recipients.
Importantly, DACA has enabled Morales to build credit, purchase a house and start a business, she said.
“Wyoming has been great to us,” she said. “I never had any issues of any kind. Because, like I said, I applied for a house. I applied for business. They know my status. Everybody knows what DACA is, so I never had any issues in Wyoming with DACA as of right now.”
Off-limits for the estimated 440 Wyoming DACA recipients are in-state college tuition, state financial aid, professional and occupational licenses and state-funded health care.
“Basically, we’re not able to afford being sick,” Morales said. “So that’s one of my biggest concerns right now. Because I mean, if I get sick, I get screwed, because health care is just too expensive.”
Despite the current lawsuit, the Biden administration has continued to fortify DACA in this regard, announcing federal health care eligibility for DACA recipients, which is planned to go into effect Nov. 1.
Supporting DACA recipients
Until Hanen’s decision, not much advocacy work can be done in the state, said Antonio Serrano, advocacy director for the ACLU of Wyoming.
“The thing that we could do, and that I’ve been trying to do here and there, is connect with as many DACA recipients as I can, people that I knew, people who I know work with DACA recipients,” Serrano said. “Just checking in with people like that and seeing how they are, what their concerns are.”
Jackson-based immigration attorney Elisabeth Trefonas has been receiving calls from Dreamers asking about early renewal in hopes of extending their status past the ruling, she said. She doesn’t deem this necessary quite yet, she said.
She has also had to turn down people requesting first-time applications.
“As always, a DACA recipient is insecure about whether the program will continue,” Trefonas wrote in an email. “We have school counselors, teachers, law enforcement agents, bankers, business owners, paralegals, and many professionals in our community who wonder if the promotions they’ve worked hard for in their careers will be stripped when Texas decides. That is a very difficult place to try and make future plans from.”
In the hands of Congress
Wyoming’s Republican U.S. Sens. John Barrasso and Cynthia Lummis have consistently voted against measures protecting DACA recipients and offering them a permanent solution. Wyoming’s lone member of the House of Representatives, Rep. Harriet Hageman, also a Republican, has not yet had the chance to vote on the issue.
While serving as the state’s U.S. House, Rep. Lummis voted against the 2010 DREAM Act (HR 5281), the bill that prompted Obama to create the DACA program through executive action.
Despite the more than 11 iterations of the DREAM Act that have died in Congress since 2001, the issue has gained bipartisan favor both among Congress and the public.
A poll conducted prior to Hanen’s 2022 ruling by nonprofit immigrant lobbying group FWD.us, found that the majority of voters across partisanship support legislation that couples citizenship opportunities for Dreamers with increased border security.
UW law professor Fowler said this type of package is the most likely measure to pass through Congress.
Currently two bipartisan renditions of the bill are at play.
- The Dream Act of 2023 (S. 264), reintroduced in February for the third time by Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) and Dick Durbin (D-Illinois).
- The Dream and Promise Act (H.R. 6) was reintroduced on June 15.
In 2018, Barrasso voted against three bills addressing a permanent solution for Dreamers, including one endorsed by former President Trump. Barrasso has also declared the program illegal, according to reports.
Gov. Mark Gordon, meanwhile, believes “first and foremost that the United States’ borders must be secure,” his spokesman Michael Pearlman said in an emailed statement.
“Border security is the federal government’s responsibility, one in which it has clearly been derelict,” Pearlman continued. “Regardless of the outcome of this recent lawsuit, additional court challenges are likely until Congress acts on this issue.”
Until then, Dreamers remain vexed by uncertainty. Morales for one hopes to continue her life in Wyoming.
“I love everything about Wyoming,” Morales said. “The only thing I don’t like is the wind.”
To those challenging the policy, Morales said: “It’s hard to explain how we feel, because they never had to feel that way.”
Wyoming Dreamers’ futures on hold pending DACA ruling - WyoFile
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