Judge: Trump must better justify ending DACA

A federal judge appointed by former President George W. Bush has ordered the Trump administration to make a stronger case for its decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program or fully reinstate it within 90 days. U.S. District Judge John Bates in Washington, D.C., said the administration’s move to end the program, which allowed hundreds of thousands of young illegal immigrants to avoid deportation, was based on “meager legal reasoning.” He gave the Department of Homeland Security 90 days to provide a “fuller explanation for the determination that the program lacks statutory and constitutional authority.” Under the Obama administration, DACA granted the right to work and stay to hundreds of thousands of immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children. Earlier this year, two other federal judges in California and New York ruled that the Trump administration must continue to renew the status of current DACA recipients. Bates’ order would go a step further and force the government to resume accepting new applications if it could not provide a better explanation for why the program should end.