'Dream Team' Immigrants Looking To GOP? | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's note: The author of this post is Barry Smith, who is an associate editor to the Carolina Journal, John Hood Publisher.

Adults under deferred-action program disappointed with Democrats

    RALEIGH     The McCrory administration's decision to offer temporary driver's licenses to some young-adult illegal immigrants has led several of the more outspoken activists to reconsider their exclusive allegiance to self-described progressive groups in North Carolina that have been tied closely to the state's Democratic Party.

    Frustrated by what they see as a failure on the part of Democrats and President Obama to deliver on a promise, a couple of members of North Carolina's "Dream Team" are knocking on Republicans' doors, hoping to find common ground with members of that party.

    "We want to send a message to the leadership of our state -- we know that that's the Republican Party," said Viridiana Martinez, who now calls Raleigh home. "We want to send a message that we want to sit down at a table and work together."

    "There's been a lot of promises and inaction from the Democratic Party; they've dominated the debate," said Jose Torres-Don. "But it has been very lacking in concrete steps to move forward."

    Martinez and Torres-Don recently were in North Carolina's legislative halls knocking on doors and presenting their case to members of the General Assembly. They said legislators listened to them and requested more information.

    The N.C. Dream Team takes its name from the acronym for the proposed federal Development, Relief, and Education of Alien Minors Act, which would provide a pathway to permanent residency and citizenship to those unauthorized immigrants. The organization, made up primarily of children and young adults who were brought to the United States illegally with their parents, seeks, among other things, passage of the DREAM Act.

    Also, they're trying to convince state lawmakers to refrain from any new legislation that would target young adults who were given temporary legal status last year under President Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

    "The reality is, more people have been deported under his presidency than any other," Martinez said. "We were just not happy with the Democrats."

    While the Dream Team members have found some sympathy in the General Assembly, some conservatives remain opposed to the driver's license provision, or any state measure that would grant favorable status to illegal immigrants.

    Ron Woodard, director of N.C. Listen, which advocates for stricter enforcement of immigration laws, suggested that some Republicans are pandering to illegal immigrants. The large number of illegal immigrants in the country, he feels, exacerbates an already dire unemployment problem.

    "Where is the concern about unemployed Americans?" Woodard asked. "I don't see any concern coming out of the legislature right now."

    Woodard said the immigrants who came with their parents are in a tough spot. "The parents put them in that position," he said, but noted that those qualifying for DACA deferrals who have reached the age of 18 are no longer children.

    "These individuals, as adults, can choose to go back to their home country after high school," Woodard said.

DREAM Act and DACA

    The DREAM Act has been introduced in Congress since 2001 in various forms, and in 2010 narrowly passed the U.S. House of Representatives, but it never has become law.

    The DACA program, the result of an executive memo signed by Obama, covers immigrants between the ages of 15 and 31 (as of June 15, 2012) who arrived in the United States before age 16, entered illegally or overstayed a visa, and have lived here continuously for at least five years. They also must have what amounts to clean criminal records -- no felony or severe misdemeanor convictions.

    Under DACA, immigrants satisfying those requirements can receive work permits for up to two years.

    In January, N.C. Secretary of Transportation Tony Tata said he would authorize temporary driver's licenses for beneficiaries of DACA if they also satisfied residency and identification requirements. Initially, Tata said the licenses would feature a pink stripe indicating that the holder was in the DACA program and not a U.S. citizen.

    After objections from some immigration activists who said the pink stripe was like a "scarlet letter" that branded them unfairly, the stripe was removed. The licenses state in red lettering, however, "LEGAL PRESENCE NO LAWFUL STATUS."

    Torres-Don said the pink identifying stripe was not a concern for him. "Many folks are up in arms about what a driver's license will look [like]," he said. "For me, I have to look at it as an option that I didn't have before. ... I'm going to get a driver's license, and I'm not going to be stuck on the issue of what it looks like."

    Some Republicans in the General Assembly say they're willing to speak with anyone about the immigration issue, including Martinez and Torres-Don.

    "I'll be glad to sit down with almost anybody," said Rep. Frank Iler, R-Brunswick, who co-chaired an interim committee looking into the state's response to the immigration issue. He noted that his fellow co-chairman, Rep. Harry Warren, R-Rowan, has "sat down with every group that you can imagine in the spectrum" as he prepares to introduce in the coming weeks a bill dealing with some of the problems posed by some illegal immigrants.

    "I feel like the federal government has hogtied the states and thrown them off a bridge," Warren said.

    Warren said that his bill seeks to deal with immigrants who have broken serious laws, rather than young immigrants covered by DACA.

    "There's no reason to be concerned about the 15- to-30-year-olds under the DACA program," Warren said. "I'm not concerned, and this legislation I'm working on is not a punitive piece of legislation geared toward everyone who's here illegally."

    Nearly three years ago, Martinez was one of three women participating in a hunger strike in support of the DREAM Act. They pitched tents in a Raleigh downtown park for about two weeks.

    Martinez and Torres-Don both were brought to the United States from Mexico by their parents when they were young.

    Martinez was 7 when she came across the border with her family. "My family came with tourist visas, and we overstayed," Martinez said. They settled in Sanford.

    They also brought her younger sister, Cynthia. "My brother, who's the youngest, he was born here," Martinez said. "He is a United States citizen who wants to join the military."

    She graduated from high school in Sanford and attended Central Carolina Community College.

    Torres-Don said his family lived in a "dirt-poor" area of Mexico before coming to the United States when he was 4. Torres-Don meant "dirt-poor" literally. The floors in his family's house were made of dirt, he said, and his father concluded there was little opportunity there for his children.

    His older sister, who was 16 at the time, had been living in the United States and had a job cleaning houses. She would call home and encourage the family to move to the United States, Torres-Don said.

    "My father and mother made a decision based on their conscience and their heart," Torres-Don said. He said he was carried in his mother's arms across the desert into the United States.

    Angeline Echeverria, executive director of El Pueblo, which advocates for Hispanics in North Carolina, said she understands the frustration that the Dream Team members have felt regarding immigration progress.

    "Many of the community members that we talk with have been disappointed by the high levels of deportation," Echeverria said. "There has been a level of disappointment with the pace of putting together comprehensive immigration reform."

    Echeverria noted that there is some movement for immigration reform on the national level. "We're happy to see that it's a bipartisan movement," she said.

    Marge Howell, a spokeswoman for the Division of Motor Vehicles, said people qualifying for a driver's license under the DACA program need to bring in the federal document showing that their application to DACA has been accepted.

    Also, they'll have to bring in other documents such as proof of age, identity, Social Security enrollment, residency, and possession of liability insurance that all others seeking a driver's license must have.

    It is unclear how many people ultimately will apply under the DACA program. "We don't have any way ourselves of knowing how many will come in," Howell said.
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