A second federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked the Trump administration from ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (‘DACA’) programme noting that while it was within the administration’s power to end DACA, they had failed to offer legally adequate justifications to do so.
Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis of the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York ruled that DACA participants and states were likely to succeed in their challenge that the way President Donald Trump terminated the Obama-era program was arbitrary and capricious. He also claimed that the the decision to end the programme was based in part on the “plainly incorrect factual premise” that the programme was illegal.
Late last year, Trump announced a plan to end DACA – the policy that allowed undocumented immigrants brought to the US as children to stay in the country – with effect from March 5, 2018. Tuesday’s ruling, combined with a ruling from a California judge last month, means the programme could end up going beyond the March 5 date. This means existing DACA recipients can renew their status but the programme will not necessarily be open to those who never applied.
