Barack Obama made it clear before he left office: If the Dreamers program ever came under attack, he’d have something to say about it. On Tuesday, in the wake of President Donald Trump’s orders to end DACA, the former commander in chief stayed true to his word.
On Tuesday afternoon, Obama shared a powerful Facebook post defending DACA (short for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), a federal program he created in 2012 to protect undocumented immigrants who entered the United States illegally as children from deportation. The program also offers its beneficiaries, known as Dreamers, such basic necessities as driver’s licenses and work permits.
Though U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday called DACA an “open-ended circumvention of immigration laws,” Obama pointed out there’s more to it than that.
“This is about young people who grew up in America—kids who study in our schools, young adults who are starting careers, patriots who pledge allegiance to our flag,” he wrote. “These Dreamers are Americans in their hearts, in their minds, in every single way but one: on paper. They were brought to this country by their parents, sometimes even as infants. They may not know a country besides ours. They may not even know a language besides English. They often have no idea they’re undocumented until they apply for a job, or college, or a driver’s license.”
Trump’s call to end DACA jeopardizes the futures of around 800,000 people who benefit from the program. Obama didn’t mince his words, calling the decision “wrong,” “self-defeating,” and “cruel.”
“To target these young people is wrong—because they have done nothing wrong,” he wrote. “It is self-defeating —because they want to start new businesses, staff our labs, serve in our military, and otherwise contribute to the country we love. And it is cruel. What if our kid’s science teacher, or our friendly neighbor turns out to be a Dreamer? Where are we supposed to send her? To a country she doesn’t know or remember, with a language she may not even speak?”
“Ultimately, this is about basic decency,” Obama continued. “This is about whether we are a people who kick hopeful young strivers out of America, or whether we treat them the way we’d want our own kids to be treated. It’s about who we are as a people—and who we want to be.”
Plenty of current and former lawmakers joined Obama in standing up for DACA, including Hillary Clinton, who tweeted that “we’ve got to fight with everything we’ve got” to defend the program.
“Subjecting Dreamers to mass deportation is part of the bigoted policies that are a cornerstone of @realDonaldTrump’s admin,” Senator Elizabeth Warren (D.–Mass.) tweeted.
You can read Obama’s full Facebook post here.