Palm Beach congresswoman: Protect the essential workers who are Florida's Dreamers

This is an opinion piece provided to The Palm Beach Post. Its views are the writer's and not necessarily of The Post's.

I am blessed to represent Florida’s 20th Congressional District and work daily to make my voice heard as the first Haitian American Democrat elected to Congress. I use my unique background to advocate for all Floridians, regardless of immigration status, because behind the political rhetoric surrounding immigration reform are real people, with real stories, in need of real action. This includes our nation’s Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders, Dreamers, and immigrant farmworkers.

Our state has one of the country’s largest populations of TPS holders, with over 13 percent of them calling Florida their home. Most TPS holders have been living and working in the United States for nearly 20 years, contributing an estimated $14 billion annually to our national GDP. To remain safely in America, these individuals are following all the rules, renewing their status, and re-registering by each deadline—this status is genuinely earned and should be protected.

Further, Florida Dreamers came to the U.S. at the average age of 8 and have been in Florida for 20 years. Today, 75 percent of them are essential members of our workforce, filling critical job openings across various sectors.

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Caught in the wake of our nation’s broken immigration system, Dreamers were forced to live in the shadows and at risk of deportation for years. That changed over 10 years ago, when President Obama established the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Under DACA, Dreamers became eligible for deportation protections and work and education authorizations, after undergoing a rigorous background check, paying fees and submitting an application.

Florida’s 23,600 DACA recipients have opened small businesses, served on the front lines of our pandemic response, bought homes, created jobs and become pillars of our communities. They are our friends, neighbors, and coworkers. Dreamers have also proven themselves to be essential to our economic future. Each year, our state’s DACA-eligible Floridians pay over $131.8 million in state and local taxes, including over 4,000 entrepreneurs and pour over $1.1 billion in spending power into our economy.

These contributions benefit every one of us in the Sunshine State. Unfortunately, the status of far too many of our immigrant neighbors continues to hang in the balance.

The Trump Administration tried to end DACA. Fortunately, their anti-immigrant efforts were blocked by the U.S. Supreme Court but that was not the end of the treacherous legal road for the program. In October, the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled DACA illegal, sending DACA recipients into unimaginable chaos and uncertainty as they await further evaluation from a Texas district court. The program’s termination could be near without action from lawmakers like myself to create legislative protections for them.

Losing our Dreamers would be an unmitigated disaster and a moral stain on our nation, ripping apart families and friends and devastating communities, workplaces, and our entire state and country.

The situation we have found ourselves in did not happen overnight. It resulted from Congress’s failing to fix our broken immigration system. For decades we have kicked this can down the road and left Dreamers to fall through the system’s many cracks.

This must not continue.

I have long advocated for comprehensive immigration reform, and with my platform, I will continue to fight for these individuals. TPS holders, Dreamers, Florida’s thousands of immigrant farmworkers, and more deserve our help.

Congress must implement long-overdue immigration reforms to permanently protect TPS holders and Dreamers through a pathway to citizenship. This solution acknowledges the reality that so many of us here in Florida know from experience: that our nation’s immigrants are Americans in every meaningful way but on paper.

I encourage my colleagues to fulfill our responsibility to our nation’s immigrants.

Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick represents Florida's 20th District, in Palm Beach and Broward counties.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick: Protect immigrant Dreamers