More checking and balancing
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A federal judge in New York has ruled that acting Homeland Security secretary Chad Wolf lacked the authority to limit the work permits of hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as children because his appointment to the top position in the department did not appear to be lawful.
U.S. District Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis — one of the first judges to block President Trump from phasing out the work permits the government issues via the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA — said in an unusual Saturday ruling that the “plain text” of the department’s order of succession showed that Wolf’s ascension to acting secretary did not follow established law and was part of several hastily crafted administration moves designed to get people into the top DHS position outside of standard procedures.
As a result, Garaufis said, Wolf’s memo in July limiting the validity of the DACA permits from two years to one year “was not an exercise of legal authority.”
Garaufis’s ruling adds to the complex legal battles surrounding the Obama-era DACA program, which was designed to give those who arrived into the United States as minors a way to stay in the country. More than 640,000 immigrants known as “dreamers” currently rely on the program to live and work in the United States.
