WASHINGTON — California, home to more than a quarter of all young people covered by the DACA program, on Monday became the latest state to challenge President Trump over his plan to shut it down.
“California has the most to lose,” said Xavier Becerra, the state’s attorney general. “Our businesses and local governments would bear the expense of ending it, and it would harm local law enforcement that depends on cooperation from immigrant families.
“In California, we don’t turn our backs on those who helped the state succeed.”
Maine, Maryland, and Minnesota joined in the lawsuit, filed in federal court in San Francisco. They joined 16 other states that went to court last week, seeking to prevent the government from terminating the DACA program.
Known as Deferred Action for Childhood arrivals, the program allows young people who came to the U.S. illegally as children to remain. Of the nearly 790,000 now covered, about 223,000 live in California.
“I’ve never seen a time when we tell children that we’ll punish them for acts they weren’t responsible for,” Becerra said.
The lawsuit contends that the president’s decision to end the program is illegal, violating a federal law requiring public notice and comment before taking significant actions. And he said it violates a legal principle that prevents the government from offering a benefit that people come to rely on, then taking it away.
The separate lawsuit filed by 16 other states, a coalition led by New York Attorney General A.G. Schneiderman, noted that more than 78 percent of young people covered by DACA came from Mexico. They claim that ending DACA “is a culmination of President Trump’s oft-stated commitments to punish and disparage people with Mexican roots.”
A third lawsuit was filed last week by the University of California and its president, Janet Napolitano. As Homeland Security secretary during the Obama administration, she helped design the DACA program. She called President Trump’s decision “nothing more than unreasoned executive whim.”
All of the challenges urge federal courts to put a hold on the president’s order until the cases can be heard and decided.
President Trump said he would end the DACA program if Congress hasn’t acted within six months to enact it into law. But he later tweeted, “If they can’t, I will revisit this issue!”