Protecting Virginia’s Dreamers

This week, we recognized the 9th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. This program provides nearly 700,000 young immigrants brought to the country as children, also known as Dreamers, the opportunity to live, attend school, and work in the United States. Unfortunately, the last administration did everything in its power to disrupt this program through anti-immigrant policies, and as a result, DACA applicants are experiencing delays.

It’s estimated that Virginia is home to more than 9,000 DACA recipients [and another 24,000 who may be eligible to apply for DACA], and I am committed to protecting these Dreamers and ensuring that they can keep contributing to the nation they love. That’s why I’ve joined my Senate colleagues in a letter calling on the Biden Administration to take meaningful action to address the processing delays and backlog for program applicants.

These Dreamers make critical contributions to Virginia and to the United States. For example, over 200,000 DACA recipients worked as critical infrastructure workers nationwide, with 2,700 in Virginia alone. They are Americans in every way, except on paper. The DACA program gives these young people the chance to be full participants in our communities without living in fear of deportation.

I’ll continue pushing for efforts to improve this vital program and for a pathway to citizenship for these Dreamers.