Administration is announcing its plans for the future of the daca program. Doris mizer, first help us understand who these socalled d. R. E. A. M. Ers are, how many are they, how long have they been in the United States on average . Well, theyre a group of people who were designated in the last administration by president obama as eligible for a program that he created, daca, deferred action for childhood arrivals. He created it in 2012, june of 2012, and said that young people whose parents had brought them here, whose parents are illegally in the country and therefore their children were eligible for deferral of deportation. As long as they had been in the country already for five years, were 16 years old, and were in school and of course didnt have any kind of a criminal record. And so that Program Began to be implemented in august of 2012 and since that time close to 800,000 people, young people who themselves are illegally in the country but were brought here as young people, in other words before they had any opportunity to make a decision about coming to the United States, and of course they have been raised here and they have been going to school here and they are american for everything but the paperwo paperwork. Where did they mostly come from . They mostly came from mexico. About 78 of them come from mexico. All together they come from mexico, guatemala, honduras and el salvador. That makes up about more than 85 . So theyre heavily from countries very nearby and primarily mexico. While theyre here in the United States, are they going to school . Whats the average education level . Well, in order for them to be eligible for daca, they have to be in high school or graduated from high school or in college or graduated from college or in the military. So one critical criterion is education. Are most of them who are eligible to work, work age, are they working . About threefourths of them are working and of those who are working about a quarter of them actually are both going to school and working. Those of course are largely young people who are by this time at college age, but theyre definitely a population that is taking care of itself, also investing in and taking the opportunity to get more skills and more education. If this program ends, what sort of Economic Impact would you estimate . Well, its very hard to say. I mean, these are 800,000 close to 800,000. Thats a very large number when you think about these people. At the same time, we have a very large labor market, we have more than 140 Million People working fwh th in this country. So the Economic Impact is going to be in very discreet areas. For instance, they are concentrated in texas and in california, about 45 live in texas or california. All together they live in about five states. Add to that new york, illinois and florida. So economic effects will be felt, in particular, labor markets in those states. But at the same time they do pay taxes and because they have better jobs with Work Authorization, theyre paying taxes, theyre paying sales taxes. And so there is a broader effect as well. Were talking with doris mizer of the Migration Policy Institute joining us for about the next 40 minutes this morning as we talk about the daca program. Again, that announcement expected from the attorney general 11 00 today well be bringing it to you on cspan. The attorney general not expected to take questions at that announcement but certainly well be following the reaction from members of congress around the country. Doris mizer though here to answer your questions about that program, about how it works, the history of that program. You can start calling in. Democrats, its 2027488000. Republicans, 2027488001. For those not family with the policy institute, what do you do there . We do policy research. Weve done a lot of work on daca over the years, tracing the numbers and looking at what the occupational and other characteristics of the daca population are, but we work on all aspects of immigration and we are very focused on policies, what makes sense on policy and what is not so helpful in policy. I should note as i gave those phone lines, a special line in this segment for undocumented immigrants. 20 2027488003. If youre part of the daca program, we would like to hear your story. Forgive me for not promoting that. Doris, you used to serve as the head of the of ins, the immigration naturalization service. If this program were to end, if daca were to end, are u. S. Border officials, immigration officials, would they be physically able to deport some 800,000 people from this country . Well, of course these young people are people who are unlikely to come into contact with deportation because they have already passed a criminal background check. They are not people that are a threat to Public Safety to qualify for the program. They have to have a clean record. What the Program Gives them is protection from deportation for two years at a time and it also gives them a Work Authorization so that they can work legally in the country. Now, if that goes away, they no longer have the Work Authorization which means that theyre in jeopardy of losing jobs because they would then be employed employers would not have the right to employ them. And so they would more likely fall into the underground economy or into far lower paying less severe circumstances. For deportation, they would be subject to deportation, particularly in the current time because the Current Administration as compared to the last administration has cast a far wider net on whos subject to deportation, but they are unlikely to be targeted for deportation unless of course the department of Homeland Security really made an effort to find them and go after them. Definitely people are fearful of that. As a practical matter i have a hard time seeing that that actually would happen because there really are plenty of far more high value, targets we could say, people who are criminals, et cetera, for deportation. But they could be swept up in collateral efforts, and so theyre very fearful and that could be an outcome. What has this attorney general, jeff sessions, said about prioritization of who gets deported . Are they following generally the same guidelines from the end of the Obama Administration . No, theyre not. They say they say that their priority is on criminals and certainly they continue to go after criminals which was the priority in the Obama Administration, but the Obama Administration had very tight guidelines. It made things like daca available. It made daca available for this particular part of the unauthorized population, but it also monitored very carefully that deportation was limited to people recently crossing the border and to people who had a criminal background record. This Administration Says its continuing to focus on criminals and indeed it is deporting criminals, but it has also been very clear in stating that anybody who is illegally in the country is subject to deportation at any time. And that has created an entirely different set of deportation actions. Lets get to the calls. Lisa is up first in raleigh, north carolina, republican. Lisa, good morning. Caller yes, hello. I want to thank you for being on this morning. I have three problems and i want you to respond to them. Hes taking away from americans, not giving to. Could you elaborate on that and tell everyone the facts . Lets its absolutely the case that these daca people at very high levels pay into the Social Security system because most employers deduct as theyre supposed to for the Social Security system. And they as long as they are illegally in the country, they cannot collect their Social Security in the way that you and i would at the point that we retire. And the Social Security system does keep that money and that money is substantial. Those are significant amounts of money that are used to balance the federal budget overall or inputs where the budget is concerned. Would they be eligible for Welfare Benefits . But they are not eligible for benefits. They are not eligible for Welfare Benefits. They are not eligible for any welfare programs. Now theyre eligible to go to a primary school, primary and secondary school. And thats the issue here, you have the population of the daca young people who go to public schools, finish high school, and then because theyre if theyre in an illegal status, they have nowhere to go with that education and with those skills. Thats whats led many states actually to make it possible for young people graduating from high school to be eligible for state colleges and universities and Community Colleges and not pay out of state tuition because this is a Human Resource and these are people that have lived most of their lives here and are likely to continue living here. So its in the interest of states and localities and of the country more broadly that those people are able to contribute. To new york, al is an independent. Good morning. Caller good morning, cspan. Thank you for taking my call. And good morning. Good morning. Question ms. Meisner. The people that migrated the turn of the last century that came into ellis island and the location out in san francisco, were they after they passed the physical exam, were they automatically granted citizenship . And i have another question after that. Okay. Yes, you know, this is they werent immediately granted citizenship. They had to apply for citizenship. But they were not subject to numerical limits coming into the country. You know, its often said that if people who are coming today would only come legally, would only come under the laws, it would not be so objectionable and it is certainly true, that ilLegal Immigration should not take place. We should not have violations of the law. We should have an immigration system that makes it possible for the people who can contribute and whom the country needs to actually come. That was the circumstance that we had prior to the First World War in the period as you say of the great migrations. The only people that were excluded were people who had particular diseases that might make it for instance, conjunctivitis which today could be cured but back then it could not be. Which would render you blind and you would not be able to work at a certain point. So that kind of thing was not all allowed. And then there were exclusions for anarchists and things like that. But otherwise the people who came, came in the numbers that they came in response to work that was available in the United States. And that is a system that we no longer have in place. We now, since the first word war have numerical ceilings and those numerical ceilings are not flexible. In the past 30, 40 years weve had a very large ilLegal Immigration, which is illegal because we now have numerical ceilings and we do not have mechanisms nor has congress been able to agree on mechanisms that would be flexible enough to allow for those labor market needs to be met by immigration in a way that took place in the past. Al, whats your followup . Caller my grandparents on my fathers side came to this country illegally. They came from russia and poland via the canadian border. They lived here. They had children. My father was first generation and now im second generation. But his father and mother were never citizens. They were just immigrants. Does that mean i have to go back to my land of origin or am i in fact a citizen . The second word war ii generation, most of those people, the young men and women, were children of quote what would be called illegal ill yal. This argument is reminiscent of when germany under the senatedies would research three generations back to declare you an official arian. And the last part of my question is, if donald trump wants to go forward with this, let him do like president obama did. Let me see President Trumps fathers citizenship papers. Does he have them . Prove it. Al in new york. The distinction there when it came to his parents situation, the Daca Recipients, Daca Recipients not born here in the United States, brought here as children. Exactly. This is one of the defining characteristics of the United States. We have something called birthright citizenship. So that if you are born in the United States, you are automatically a citizen. Some count industries have whats called from the soil, from nationality, that you can only be a citizen if your parents were citizens. We do not have that. As long as you were born in the United States you are a citizen. So this gentleman that called, he is legitimately a United States citizen having been born here. Remind us the concept behind being born in the United States and becoming a citizen. Why did we choose that path . Well we chose that path because were an immigrant snags. We are a nation formed by immigrants and were a democracy that believes that democracy can only thrive and succeed with participation and participation requires equal legal standing. And so if youre born here, you are a citizen and you have the full rights participation in this society. A special line in this segment of the washington journal for undocumented immigrants, especially if you are in the daca program, wed will interested in hearing your story, 2027488003. Nat is a democrat from silver spring, go ahead. Caller thank you for taking my call. I would like to say especially for the immigrants from United States. The United States was the one who create all this mess. By creating little wars in the region with Central America, you know, when all of the invasion and all of the the government in guatemala and el salvador, honduras, all of those people come here legally because theyre fleeing all of the pressure and mercenaries of the United States, i believe, this is people, they came here fleeing all of those wars from Central America. Thank you very much. Did you want to comment . Well, the flows from Central America indeed did begin in earnest in the 1908s, in the 1970s but certainly the 1980s and the 1990s which is what caller is referring to, the wars in Central America. And once those migration pathways, the migration traditions form, they tend to be perpetuated because people follow their family members and the whole Central America region, guatemala, honduras, el salvador in particular have in the grip of the aftermath of those wars and of course now we see very Serious Problems of violence. And cartels and narcotics trafficking that are keeping those countries in very precarious circumstances. So the flows from the whats called the northern triangle, Central America, those three countries, are a very important part of our immigration patterns in the recent past. And im quoting numbers from the migrations policy institutes website. In terms of countries where Daca Recipients were originally brought from, mexico accounts for 78. 5 but mexico, el salvador and honduras combined account ffr 87 of all Daca Recipients. You can see the chart available on the Migration Policy Institutes website. A good map there as well if you want to check out the states where Daca Recipients currently reside. Jason is in ft. Collins, colorado, line for independents. Go ahead. Caller good morning, doris. Thank you for being part of the panel. Good morning. Thank you. Y caller youre welcome. My daughter attended an Elementary School that had a large number of Illegal Immigrants from mexico. My question is how did daca affect the classroom time half taught in spanish and half taught in english . Well im not sure that daca really had much effect on that. Schools that have large populations of foreign born students are dealing with language issues all over the country. And although spanish is the predominant language, there are many other languages that are represented in student age populations because we have a country that is presently and for a few decades at a high point of immigration, both Legal Immigration and ilLegal Immigration. So the issues of language are issues that i think are much larger and the numbers are much larger where language issues are concerned than simply the daca population. The daca population does and you know, students in general do have a Real Advantage in the fluency in two languages. Caller correct. Thats particularly important in the labor market. Jason, can i ask you caller i agree with that. Do you think its fair necessarily for predominantly English Speaking to have to learn spanish as a trade for education . Well, you know, education policy in this country is local and up to the states and localities and there are such different points of view. I think you said that your experience was in california, am i correct about that . Colorado, right . Caller excuse me . Colorado. Pardon me. All right. I dont know what colorados policies are. And i dont you know, i think that were a country that needs to be more focused on Foreign Languages. We are part of a global economy. Language is very important in international commerce. Weve not had the kind of focus on Foreign Language that many other countries in the world have had. So i think at the end of the day its a benefit for american born kids to be exposed to Foreign Languages. To louisville, kentucky, sara is on our line for democrats. Good morning. Caller good morning. My name is dara and im from louisville, kentucky where our mayor emerged and said that we have 5,000 drooemz in our city. And President Trump said this is the opportunity for congress to legislate daca when obama passed the drooemz act. Im wondering what legislation of daca would look like and what would happen if this doesnt become a reality. Well that certainly is now where the burden will rest, assuming that the announcement today is what we expect it to be. The pressure will be on congress and the responsibility will be with congress. Now, you know, this d. R. E. A. M. Act goes far back. The d. R. E. A. M. Act was first introduced in 2001 in congress and first introduced by senator hatch, a republican, you know, on the Judiciary Committee in the senate. There have been a number of iterations since. There have been a couple of bills introduced this year, both in the house and the senate. They have various formulas. But they all basically deal with a particular age group and with a particular number of years that people would be in a conditional legal status then earn their way to be permanent legal status or the green card. The real difficulty is whether congress can legislate on this at all. There is a different level of pressure now given the way in which this support for the daca population is showing itself and the bipartisan nature of the support, not only parties within the congress, lots of republicans and lots of democrats supporting but also heavy, heavy support from the business community. Other parts of the country. But congress has not been able to deal effectively with immigration legislation. Six months is a fairly short period of time, given all of the issues that are on congresss agenda. So well have to see. I think here the question really will become can the congress swallow hard and can the leadership decide to make this be bipartisan. Because if the congress, par l particularly the house is willing to bring up a bill that is voted on both by democrats and republicans rather than the rabb tradition for more than a decade, the bills come up if they will be voted on only by the republican party, if the speaker who has said that he wants to see legislation and that he believes that Congress Needs to fix this, if the speaker is willing to bring up a bill and let both democrats and republicans come together to create a majority vote, then it could happen. But if not, the part of the Republican Caucus in the house that has always been against any kind of immigration legislation may very well be able to hold this hostage again. You mentioned the Business Leaders that are lining up to try to save daca. For. Us, a group thats trying to mobilize the Technology Sector estimates that would Daca Recipients, the economy would lose 4. 43 billion dollars from the gdb and money in Social Security and medicare tax contributions. They also estimate an average of about 30,000 Daca Recipients per month would see their Work Authorizations expire, making them ineligible for work if the program ends. Do those numbers sound right to you . We dont know. We havent look at the numbers. Theyre certainly big numbers. They point to the fact that for the Daca Recipients and the undocumented population, a fear of deportation. But in fact the issue that is now coming to the floor that is also very important is the Work Authorization and the anbility o work legally in the economy. These Business Leaders, 400 of them that signed a letter last week talking about the effects it would have on their businesses. And these are big businesses, particularly in the tech community, naming the numbers in their companies of employees and the kiensnds of work that they who are Daca Recipients naps a new very specific and influential voice that will be heard now in the congress, i believe. To westminster, maryland, betty is an independent. Good morning. Caller good morning. Go ahead. Youre on. Caller yeah. I just want to i heard the lady say that congress had only six months to cause the bill and do an agreement. But six months if they keep working like the hard workers in america, they can do the job. Because all the people pay their check, the paycheck. So its time to work. Now my personal opinion about Illegal Immigrants, i came to the United States legally. Im a citizen of the United States. My family is too. I follow all of the laws the United States asks for because thats just the respect for any country you go. And i think its not fair for people who follow the law to struggle and all citizens to struggle to have insurance and find a job people illegally come and take the job from the citizens. Now, the question for you and for all of the people to listen to this radio, when the when the kids do something wrong, do you pun ush them or do you give a present to them, do you betty, i think we got your point. She brings up this issue that weve heard about before, this sort sengs between legal immigrants and Illegal Immigrants. Can you talk through that a little bit . Absolutely theres that tern tension. And absolutely our immigration system and the history of our country is one where the rule of law is very important. Its a central tenant of what we believe in. In this particular case the law is very out of date. The last time that the congress legislated on Legal Immigration levels was in 1990. Thats more than 25 years ago. Thats a very different economy. And so the law has not aligned with the economy and the needs of the economy. People have, of course, come legally under the immigration law. We have a generous immigration system. We have about a Million People a year that come to the country legally. But at the same time, we have had a job market, particularly in the 1990s and the early 2000s that was demanding more workers than that law allowed. And so people did come to the country illegally. Generally from the same countries where people came legally. Because thats where the connections were, thats where the family relationships were, thats where the traditions for immigration existed. And it is not to say that that was right. Its not to say that that should be justified. But it is to describe the reality of what happened and what it is that we as a country were absolutely prepared to tolerate for many years because it meant that we were Getting Better goods and services, that we were paying less for our food, that we had the kind of labor Market Growth that made life better for almost all americans that contributed to the gdp. So yes, the people that came illegally did make a decision to come illegally, but there were many other factors that were at play. Last call for doris. Earnest has been waiting in michigan. Line for democrats. Go ahead. Caller yes. I was wondering. The president s order on daca, will it only affect those people in the hispanic and the asian and the Jamaican Community or will it also affect the ones coming in illegally from europe, western europe, eastern europe, asia and those countries . Okay . Yes. Daca applies just to young people whose parents brought them to the United States illegally. And they could have come from many countries around the world. They primarily came from mexico, guatemala, honduras and el salvador doo salvador. But there are other nationalities who are represented among the 800,000 who have daca. And so they would be subject to whatever the policy changes as well. 10 thousand from the philippines since daca was started, 17,000 from korea. But the vast majority from the country of mexico, 439,000 out of that 800,000. Dororis meisner, migration policy. Org. If you want to check out their work. Thank you so much for you time. Thank you. Cspans washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up wednesday morning work Texas Democratic congressman al green discussed Hurricane Harvey aid and centers for Immigration Studies mark talks about the trumps decision to overturn daca immigration policy. Be sure to watch cspans washington journal live at 7 00 a. M. Eastern wednesday morning. Join the discussion. Sunday night on q a, founder and ceo of open the books on how taxpayers dollars are spent and the need for government transparency. Veterans affairs, weve audited their checkbook for the past four years and last summer we found that during a period where up to a thousand sick veterans died while waiting to see a doctor, that the va spent 20 million on a high end art portfolio. It was 27foot Christmas Trees priced like cars, 21,000. It was skull culp a cube rock sculpture in for landscaping for 1. 2 million. This is the type of waste thats in your government. Sunday night at 8 00 eastern on cspans q a. Have a look at the base realignment and closure process known as brac. Topics include the current view from capitol hill, pending legislation and the prospects for a new round of closures. Speakers including former Veterans Affair secretary who chaired the last Brac Commission in 2005. The Heritage Foundation hosts this hour and ten minute event