Angelica Idrovo of Danbury awaits U.S. Supreme court decision. Photo credit: Photo: H John Voorhees III / Hearst Connecticut Media
Angelica Idrovo, like millions across the country, is anxiously awaiting an impending U.S. Supreme Court decision that could quell or stoke fears that she could be deported.
But her elation was short-lived. Texas and 25 other states sued to block the new initiatives soon after they were announced, and lower courts have ruled in their favor. The programs have never taken effect, and the Supreme Court’s decision on the matter could come later this week as its term is wrapped up.
“I was devastated,” she said. “I felt like I was small again.”
“It has been over a year that I could have worked at a better job, over a year that I could have gotten more scholarships for universities,” she said.
Idrovo, who graduated from Naugatuck Valley Community College last week, recently went to Washington, D.C., with her brother to hear the Supreme Court arguments in the case.
Last February, the Texas federal court preliminary blocked the president’s executive actions. About nine months later, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld the lower court’s ruling, causing the U.S. Justice Department to seek a Supreme Court review of the decision — which was granted this January. A Supreme Court decision is expected by late June.
A decision in favor of the administration would allow the programs to take effect in the waning months of Obama’s presidency. A loss or even a tie vote (possible because of the vacancy created by Justice Antonin Scalia’s death in February) would block them for the foreseeable future.
The programs announced by Obama in November 2014 would apply to parents whose children are citizens or are living in the country legally — called Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA). Eligibility also would be expanded for the president’s 2012 effort that allowed certain undocumented immigrants who entered the country before their 16th birthdays and have lived in the U.S. since June 15, 2007, to receive a renewable two-year work permit and exemption from deportation.
More than 700,000 people have taken advantage of…….
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