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Reforming Immigration Reform

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Reforming Immigration Reform Problem Definition In what could arguably have been the shot heard around the world during the 2012 election year, President Obama in June issued an executive order suspending deportations of low-priority undocumented immigrants under the age of 30 (Office of the Press Secretary, 2012). The order targeted young Hispanics who had been brought to the United States by their parents years ago, the so-called 'Dreamers.' During the rest of the campaign, Obama spent considerable time courting the minority vote based on the assumption that his position on immigration reform would be more appealing to Hispanic voters than his opponent's (Boyer, 2012). His gamble seems to have paid off. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is at the heart of the debate over immigration reform, since federal policies that control paths to citizenship, border security, and deportations of illegal immigrants are mediated by DHS agencies. These agencies include Customs & Border Protection, Citizenship & Immigration Services (CIS), the Coast Guard, and Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) (DHS, 2012). A recently released report from the Migration Policy Institute highlighted the effects of a de facto "enforcement first" immigration policy that has emerged in the federal government (Meissner, Kerwin, Chishti, and Bergeron, 2013). The primary components of this policy are border security, visa controls, data collection, workplace purges, detention, deportation,

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