BPC Issues Road Map for Bipartisan DACA Deal

Washington, D.C.– A policy package combining permanent protections and a path to citizenship for so-called DREAMers with investments in increased border security can gain bipartisan support, according to a new issue brief published today by the Bipartisan Policy Center.

The brief, A Roadmap for a DACA Deal, provides more detail on broad provisions that were outlined in statement issued by BPC’s Immigration Task Force upon President Trump’s termination of the DACA program, and a recent op-ed by two task force co-chairs—former Homeland Security Sec. Michael Chertoff and former Housing and Urban Development Sec. Henry Cisneros.

A Roadmap for a DACA Deal lays out a range of specific policy steps that could and should be part of a permanent solution on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program.

The framework calls for including for current DACA recipients and other young people in similar situations in a permanent program, providing those young people with a path to a green card and—eventually—citizenship, and for setting aside the question of parents and relatives of DREAMers in the current debate. With respect to immigration enforcement, the framework suggests dozens of specific options for utilizing increased border resources under the broad headings of technology, infrastructure, and personnel.

The roadmap also calls for keeping the deal narrow to increase the possibility of quickly enacting a fix.

“Finding agreement will mean that a DACA deal cannot become a ‘wish list’ for either interior enforcement on the right or more expansive immigration reforms on the left,” the document states.

BPC’s Immigration Task Force is co-chaired by Chertoff, Cisneros, and former governors Ed Rendell and Haley Barbour, and includes representatives of business and labor as well as former Democratic and Republican members of Congress.