WASHINGTON – California Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris grilled Acting Homeland Security Secretary Elaine Duke Wednesday on whether customs officials will share information about Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients, but Duke said she didn’t know what the so-called Dreamers had been promised.
During a Senate Committee on Homeland Security hearing, Harris pressed Duke repeatedly to promise to not allow Citizen and Immigration Services, which processed DACA applications, to provide data to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which handles deportations.
“I can’t unequivocally promise that, no,” Duke said. “I’m not familiar with the promise that was made to these children.”
Harris presented a statement from the Citizen and Immigration Services website that says no DACA information will be shared with ICE and a 2016 letter from then-Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson stating the same thing.
“I would advise you to familiarize yourself with these documents because we are talking about 700,000 young people in this country right now who are in utter fear about their future,” Harris said.
Deyanira Aldana, a 22-year-old DACA recipient who attended the hearing, said that her “number one fear” is information being shared with ICE when applications are submitted.
“I’m a DACA recipient myself, Aldana said. “I’m worried that, because of this, deportation will literally be sitting on my front steps.”
Aldana praised Harris for standing up for Dreamers at the hearing and said “Congress needs to act” to pass a law to legitimize the DACA program and its recipients.
Harris also demanded that Duke push for an extension of the Oct 5 deadline, when DACA expires. She cited difficulties applicants who hoped to renew their status have had because of hurricanes and the $495 cost of the application.
Duke responded that her agency has not received any requests for a deadline extension from recipients, claiming that the application process is “simple” and the original deadline was created to “end the program in a compassionate manner.”