Nine states have requested a federal judge in Texas to block the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. The controversial program was first enacted under President Barack Obama and was renewed under President Biden last year.
Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Nebraska, South Carolina, West Virginia, Kansas, and Mississippi have filed a legal case saying that Biden has overstepped his powers by having the immigration policy renewed on his own without having to go through Congress. They added in the lawsuit that the case they are presenting in the lawsuit has to do entirely with “the scope of executive power” and not with the actual immigration policy. In the lawsuit, they note that the President does not have the power to completely override Congress laws only because they liked a specific policy.
On Aug. 30, 2022, Biden’s DACA decision had been announced and went into effect on Oct. 31. In the lawsuit they claimed that Biden’s program suffers from the same flaws that Obama’s program suffered from. Obama’s DACA program was “already found unlawful by this Court and the Fifth Circuit.”
In the legal filing, it was also pointed out the U.S. Supreme Court had opposed Obama’s claims that DACA was executive discretion. Executive discretion refers to a policy that would provide law enforcement officers with the option to not enforce a law by the book. For example, a police officer may at times choose not to write a traffic ticket for a violation, even if an individual had been suspected to be going over the speed limit.
