Deferred Deportation Hasn’t Alleviated Immigrants’ Uncertainty - Higher Education: When President Barack Obama announced that he would direct the Department of Homeland Security to grant deferred deportation and a work permit for two years to undocumented immigrant youth who meet certain criteria, he renewed hope for a better future for a million young people.
“There aren’t really words to express how we felt at that time,” says Lorella Praeli, policy coordinator for the immigrant advocacy organization, United We Dream. Since the June 15 announcement, tens of thousands of people like Frida, 18, an undocumented student at San Jacinto Community College in Texas, have started to gather personal documents and apply for the program.
The teen, who did not want to disclose her last name for privacy reasons, says she first went to the Mexican Consulate to get official identification to provide the U.S. government for her application. Her aunt then sent her the forms to fill out and send in. Yet, the jargon-filled documents stopped her in her tracks and fear started to set in.
