STUART, Fla. — Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court will begin hearing arguments about the Trump administration’s decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
Supreme Court Justices will be tasked with deciding if the Trump Administration gave enough legal reason to end DACA and whether the Supreme Court has the authority to intervene.
Immigration experts say this is leaving hundreds of thousands of people's futures in limbo.
Local Immigration Attorney, Christopher Gaston, says he represents about 50 people locally who are in the United States under DACA, or waiting for the chance to apply for it.
He will be closely following the developments in the hearings for his clients.
“They’re understandably very nervous and dealing with a lot of uncertainty,” Gaston said.
The Trump administration announced in 2017 it would be ending DACA, calling it unconstitutional.
It allows children of undocumented migrants to stay in the U.S. if they were under the age of 16 when their parents brought them to the United States.
“It’s really going to determine whether these young people, these 800,000 young people, who have been involved in the DACA program are going to be able to remain in the United States based on that program, or is that program going to end ... We don’t have another solution for those young people right now, so it’s of critical importance.”
Lower courts have blocked the move to end DACA.
No new DACA applications are being accepted.
Gaston says those already under the program are currently under travel restrictions. They do not know how much longer DACA might protect them from possible deportation.
“There’s a lot riding on these decisions,” Gaston said.
Gaston says he will also be listening to the questions being asked, hoping to get an idea of which way the Justices are leaning when they rule in 2020.
“We’re talking about hundreds of thousands of kids who came to the United States very young. They’re brought to the United States and this, in many cases, is the only home they’ve ever known, and they may be asked to return to a place they don’t know.”