Dick Durbin: “it was 1 year ago this week that President Obama announced he would use his Executive authority to reform our broken…”

“it was 1 year ago this week that President Obama announced he would use his Executive authority to reform our broken immigration system. The President said we should prioritize the deportation of those who have been convicted of serious crimes or those who pose any threat to America's security. The Department of Homeland Security only has funding to deport a small fraction of the undocumented immigrants in the country. So the President said: Let's make a priority. Let's focus our limited resources on deporting those who could do us harm. It seemed like common sense to most people. At the same time, the President said we should not waste our resources deporting young immigrant students who grew up in this country and would, in fact, if they were deported, tear their families apart. The President's policies focused on deporting felons, not families-- criminals, not children. In 2012 President Obama established the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, known as DACA. DACA provides temporary--let me underline the word ``temporary''--immigrant status to immigrant students who arrived in the United States as children. This program is based on the DREAM Act, a bill I introduced 14 years ago in the Senate. That bill was introduced to give undocumented students who grew up in America a chance to earn their path to citizenship. We call them DREAMers. It was known as the DREAM Act. They were brought to the United States as kids, some as infants.…”