Letter: DACA participants must be protected

Sunday January 21, 2018

Editor:

Today the future of more than 800,000 humans is threatened. Life goals are in limbo. Law-abiding, hardworking young people are living under threat of detention, deportation and the loss of any ability to support themselves or their families.

In what nation do these 800,000 live? What nation would cast out innocents who have broken no laws? Shamefully, it is happening in the United States, a place founded on Christian principles and the promise of liberty and justice for all. That promise is being broken before our eyes.

Here we are either immigrants or original Americans. If you are not an indigenous American, you are an immigrant or a descendant of immigrants from somewhere else.

From the very first, immigration to this country and its consequences have shaped the heart of our democracy and influenced everything that is both wrong and right about us.

As "A 'Dreamer' speaks and tears flow" (Reading Eagle, Jan. 13) illustrated, our own communities and young people are affected. Gov. Tom Wolf has spoken out for the young people at risk.

Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, provides protection and a pathway to legal status for children of immigrants brought to this county, many as infants. Human lives are not bargaining chips. These young people are the promise of a new generation. In every way, they will be vital to community and country, if we stand with them.

Support DACA and a clean Dream Act. We need to get this right.

Jennifer Hanf
Centre Township

DACA participants must be protected