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Biden's About-Face on DACA, Immigration Policy Is Huge Relief to ‘Dreamer' at Brandeis

"On certain weekends that the administration would announce immigration raids, I hid in my apartment for days without leaving in fear that I would get rounded up"

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This "Dreamer" has lived on the edge since 2017, when President Donald Trump took office and vowed to abolish DACA, the program that shields hundreds of thousands who came to the United States as children from deportation.

"The emotional trauma that we have lived for the last four years has been excruciating," Brandeis University student Elias Rosenfeld said.

"It has lead our lives to be in limbo, waiting on court to court," he said.

Rosenfeld moved -- legally -- to Miami from Venezuela when he was six with his mother, who was on track to become a citizen. But when he was 12, his mother died, and Rosenfeld instantly became undocumented.

The Supreme Court decision defending Dreamers was just the latest twist in a long battle over undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children. But how did the DACA program begin in the first place? And what happens next? Emily Tisch Sussman, legal expert and host of the podcast Your Primary Playlist, breaks it down.

Two years later, President Barack Obama passed the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program and Rosenfeld, a top student, took full advantage.

"It allowed me to get internships, it allowed me to volunteer and work with nonprofits and it led me to get a full scholarship at Brandeis, where I am studying today," he said.

But that feeling of security vanished during the Trump administration. 

"On certain weekends that the administration would announce immigration raids, I hid in my apartment for days without leaving in fear that I would get rounded up," Rosenfeld said.

A decision by the Supreme Court blocked the Trump administration's efforts to end DACA.

So when Joe Biden was sworn in as president on Wednesday, there was a tremendous sense of relief for the roughly 600,000 DACA recipients. 

"On his first day in office, he introduced an immigration bill that would provide people like myself a pathway to citizenship," Rosenfeld said.

Biden's immigration bill would also stop work on the border wall and lift the travel ban. 

Eva Millona, executive director of the Massachusetts Immigration and Refugee coalition, called it "one of the most ambitious and progressive bills that we have seen."

Millona said that polls now show the majority of Americans see immigration reform as a win-win: "Economically responsible, politically smart and it reflects the values of who we are as a country."

Rosenfeld noted that under the Biden proposal, "We would have permanent protections that give us the stability that we deserve. 

Opponents say Biden's bill provides "open borders" and "total amnesty." Not true, say immigration advocates, who call that voice a small but vocal minority. 

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