LOS ANGELES – Tommy Esquivel graduated from Hollywood High School in Southern California last week with awards honoring his determination, service record, and highest grade point average in his environmental science class. advanced placement. “I’m excited to see what you can do with your future,” her science teacher, Alycia Escobedo, said in a farewell note. “Do great things.”
But Mr. Esquivel, 19, who grew up in Los Angeles without legal immigration status, faces significant hurdles in realizing his potential. He has limited access to financial aid for college. In many states, you cannot get a driver’s license. Without a Social Security number, you cannot work legally. And although he has been living in the United States since the age of 9, he could be deported to Guatemala at any time.
For the first time, most undocumented immigrants graduating from high school in the United States do not have any of the protections offered for the past 10 years under an Obama-era program that protected most of the so-called Dreamers of deportation and offered them. access to jobs and help with university tuition.
The Deferred Arrival Program for Children Arrives was intended as a temporary measure to protect some of the country’s most vulnerable immigrants: young people who were brought into the country as children and who have grown up essentially as Americans, until Congress could agree on a comprehensive review of immigration. or at least pass a bill to give them a path to citizenship.
During the decade since DACA came into force in June 2012, some 800,000 young people have registered. But a long-term political solution never materialized. Under the constant attack of Republican immigration hawks, DACA stopped accepting new applications; has remained embroiled in legal battles since President Donald J. Trump tried to cancel the program in 2017.
Mr Esquivel is among the nearly 100,000 young immigrants entering precarious adulthood this spring, without the most basic tools to build a future in the only country many of them have ever known.
“After doing all this work, I don’t know where it will take me,” Mr. Esquivel, who met his parents in the United States from Guatemala when he was in third grade. “I don’t know what to do.”
DACA, which over the years has attracted some bipartisan support because its beneficiaries are among the most sympathetic undocumented immigrants in the country, has been transformative for many by allowing them to work legally and, by extension, pay for college, build racing and buying homes. The idea among supporters was that Congress would finally address the immigration status of the 11 million people who are illegally in the country, making the temporary program unnecessary.
“The hope was that DACA would be a bridge to legislation and that an administrative program would no longer be needed because there would be a statutory one,” said Alejandro Mayorkas, the national security secretary, who led the federal agency that designed and directed. the program that went into effect on June 15, 2012.
“Division seems to be an obstacle even to doing things for which there is a bipartisan agreement,” he said in an interview.
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Immigration analysts estimate that the new class of young immigrants who grew up in the United States but do not have legal status or DACA protection will grow by 100,000 each year.
Today, 60 percent of DACA-protected people are 26 or older, and even though the program survives pending legal challenges, there is no way to enroll younger immigrants like Mr. Esquivel, who arrived in 2012, unless modified to include them, is unlikely given the political disagreement over immigration.
“For me, DACA was a crucial test for when we would legalize millions of people,” said Gaby Pacheco, 37, a former undocumented student who led a campaign from 2010 that brought the plight of Dreamers to the American public and convinced the Obama administration to provide them with relief.
“But here we are 10 years later; It’s like we went back, ”said Ms. Pacheco, director of TheDream.US, a program that offers college scholarships for undocumented students.
The inability to hire tens of thousands of high school graduates comes amid a “massive shortage” of labor that has developed in part due to the aging population and low birth rates in the country, he said. say Neil Bradley, director of policy for the US Chamber of Commerce.
“Congress has had a decade to resolve this issue, and it challenges the reason they haven’t found a way forward,” he said.
Teresa Pérez, 19, who emigrated to the United States from Mexico when she was 2 years old, was about to turn 15, the age to apply for DACA, when Mr. Trump terminated the program in September 2017.
However, Ms. Perez persevered – encouraged by her older sister, who has DACA protection – and was admitted to the University of Utah last year. It raised grants from groups that did not require DACA status to cover tuition.
But after completing general education classes in her first semester, she was informed that she could not enter the nursing program because she did not have a Social Security number.
“It costs you a lot when something like this affects your life,” Ms. Perez, who is aware that the shortage of nurses is forcing many American hospitals to hire abroad.
Domonick, a 22-year-old undocumented student from Turks and Caicos, arrived in the United States in 2007 at the age of seven. Eight years later, he could only see how others his age applied for DACA: he had entered the country a few days after the program’s closing date.
Without DACA, you cannot obtain a Florida driver’s license or state ID. A scholarship from TheDream.US has allowed him to attend Florida International University. He plans to graduate in December with a bachelor’s degree in accounting and data analysis.
“Will I be able to find work in my field, contribute to this country, ever live a normal life?” said Domonick, who did not want his last name to be used for fear of drawing the attention of authorities. “Will I have to pack up and leave the only place I call home?”
Asians make up the fastest-growing cohort of undocumented students, including James Song, who arrived in Chicago from South Korea on a tourist visa when he was 9 and never left.
While attending high school for the past two years, he has worked long hours for cash at Korean restaurants to save for college, and hopes to study biochemistry in the fall at the University of Illinois. Despite receiving some grants, it is still low.
“These problems have made it difficult for me to hope and see the future,” he said. Song, 19, has received support from the Hana Center, a non-profit organization that serves Asian immigrants.
But you can’t imagine living in any other country. “Everyone I know is here,” he said. “I’m not good at reading or speaking Korean.”
Mr. Esquivel also grew up in Los Angeles speaking more English than Spanish.
At Hollywood High, a Southern California landmark, graduates include actress Judy Garland and Warren Christopher, a former secretary of state, Mr. Esquivel was admitted to the New Media Academy, a magnet program that combines college preparation with training in video production and animation. .
He excelled academically, joining the baseball team and campus clubs. He did school visits. “All the kids were trying to figure out where they belonged on the social ladder,” said their first-year English teacher Casey Klein. “Tommy was really himself, kind to everyone. He never complained.”
He rarely spoke of his status as an undocumented.
In 2020, Ms. Klein recommended him as a mentor for a summer program that facilitated the arrival of high school students at risk in high school, a position that paid $ 15 an hour.
But the school district’s employment form required him to enter a Social Security number.
“The most endearing thing about Tommy is that he said, ‘They can’t pay me for my condition, but I still want to do it,'” Ali Nezu, coordinator of the New Media Academy, recalled.
He mastered digital editing and became an expert in the use of professional cameras.
“I want to be a cinematographer,” Mr. Dodge, “or a flu, just someone capable of helping the set and fixing anything you need to fix.”
But he has continued to miss opportunities.
He was approached last summer to do film internships, but had to turn down because he is undocumented.
Early in her senior year, Ms Nezu intended to recommend her for a paid internship at the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, one that had boosted the careers of some Hollywood students. When it became clear that undocumented students were not eligible, he chose another student.
On April 12, Mr. Esquivel was accepted to the San Francisco State University Film School.
Mr. Esquivel celebrated it with his family and teachers. But then he looked closely at his situation.
Most of their tuition would be covered by a state grant for which paperless students qualify. But how could you afford $ 17,000 in room and food without being able to work?
He decided to enroll in a community college near Los Angeles, Santa Monica College, where he could live at home.
On his last day of school on Friday, Mr. Esquivel thanked each of his teachers, with wet eyes as they described him as a gift to the school community.
“Everyone loves you and feels good around you,” his English teacher Bodin Adler said before approaching him for a hug. “I’ll really miss you.”
In his family’s modest flat, Mr. Esquivel’s mother displayed her high school awards — a glass trophy, a wooden plaque, and certificates — on a table.
His group of friends planned a road trip to San Diego, but Mr. Esquivel decided that it would not be better, lest …