Juliette Kayyem On Supreme Court DACA Decision

Hannah Uebele is a producer for Under the Radar with Callie Crossley and previously worked as associate producer for Boston Public Radio. She graduated from Tufts University with a B.S. in English and Environmental Studies. She's a proud Delawarean but has found herself saying "wicked" more and more often, so the Bostonian metamorphosis is well underway.Contact: hannah_uebele@wgbh.org

June 19, 2020

Updated August 07, 2023

On Thursday, the Supreme Court rejected President Donald Trump's attempt to cancel the Obama era policy Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). DACA offers legal protection for hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as children.

For now, they retain their protection from deportation, but homeland security expert Juliette Kayyem spoke with Boston Public Radio on Friday about what happens if the Trump administration tries to rescind the policy again.

"Trump this morning said they're going to go back and look at this, but I think that's bogus," she said. "Trump in some ways is probably grateful for this decision, because otherwise he would've had to have owned the deportation of 'dreamers.'"

Eighty percent of Americans view "dreamers" as an exception to normal immigration rules, Kayyem noted. "I think this is a great moment not just for 'dreamers,' but for all Americans."

Kayyem is an analyst for CNN, former assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security and faculty chair of the homeland security program at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.