"As the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) continues to focus its enforcement resources on the removal of individuals who pose a danger to national security or a risk to public safety, including individuals convicted of crimes with particular emphasis on violent criminals, felons, and repeat offenders, DHS will exercise prosecutorial discretion as appropriate to ensure that enforcement resources are not expended on low priority cases, such as individuals who came to the United States as children". " [emphasis added]
All nine members of the Dream 9 being held in Eloy prison first came to the United States as children under 16, one as young as four months old.
The Dream 9 Protest
Started With The Dreamers in Graduation Garb
A week earlier, on July 22, they were all wearing graduation caps and gowns, signifying their high school and college diplomas and degrees, as they walked from the Mexican side of the border in Nogales to the U.S. immigration offices, where they sought to re-enter the U.S. legally.
Six of them had come to this country as children and lived most of their lives here, becoming American is almost every way but legally, eventually getting caught up in the byzantine application of immigration law enforcement that effectively exiled them from their own country. The other three members of the Dream 9 voluntarily left the U.S. in order to take part in this action, to highlight the injustice of U.S. immigration law and to test the government's ability to exercise prosecutorial discretion and to act justly.
At the U.S. immigration office in Nogales, the Americans promptly took the Dream 9 into custody, even though each of them presented officials with documents that supported their individual stories, along with formal requests for admission to the U.S.
Tucson attorney Margo Cowan represented the Dream 9 and formally asked the federal officials to grant each of the nine a humanitarian parole, which would allow them to return home in the U.S. to await formal proceedings. She argued that her clients were not a flight risk and wanted only to go home and continue their lives. Each of the Dream 9 also requested asylum in the U.S., a request the U.S. has ignored.
The Private Prison
Contractor Has An Ugly Public Reputation
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