Obama has big post-election plans on immigration. Here's what you need to know

Obama has big post-election plans on immigration. Here's what you need to know

by Dara Lind at Vox

http://www.vox.com/2014/10/30/7131905/obama-immigration-reform-how-what-immigrants-millions-plan

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President Obama has promised that he's going to take executive action on immigration before the end of 2014, and rumor has it that the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice will submit their recommendations for what exactly the president should do by early November.

Obama's plan is expected to include relief from deportation for millions of immigrants. The new program might build on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program from 2012, which allowed young immigrants who would have benefited from the DREAM Act  to apply for two years of protection from deportation, and for work permits. Or it might take a slightly different form, but one that would still allow some unauthorized immigrants to be protected from deportation, and be allowed to work, without officially giving them legal status.

Nothing's known for sure about what the new immigration program will do — after all, the White House hasn't made a final decision yet. But here's what we know they're considering, and what looks likely to make it into the final package.

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Legally speaking, the president could extend deferred action to all 11 million unauthorized immigrants. That would be unprecedented. If he wanted to follow precedent slightly more closely, he could protect all of the 8 million or so unauthorized immigrants who would qualify for legal status under the immigration reform bill the Senate passed  last year — just like he used DACA to protect would-be DREAM Act beneficiaries after the DREAM Act failed. 

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