After their work permits expired, an immigration attorney near San Diego was fired and a nurse in the East Bay was placed on unpaid leave.
Both depend on work permits and legal protections provided under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, a program created by President Obama in 2012 for immigrants brought to the US as children. But recent processing delays at US Citizenship and Immigration Services leave many DACA recipients at risk of arrest and deportation as their two-year work permits expire.
“It is definitely an attack on the system,” said the lawyer, Maria Fernanda Madrigal. “My first thought was, ‘Oh, they’re so smart.
Over the past few years, the average processing times for DACA renewals have been less than two months. Now, most cases are completed within 3.5 months, according to Citizenship and Immigration Services.
The agency did not explain what caused the processing delay. Spokesman Zach Kahler wrote in a statement that “Under the leadership of President Trump, USCIS is protecting the American people by carefully screening and vetting all aliens.”
DACA does not grant any kind of legal status in this country, he said.
During his first term in office, Trump tried to rescind DACA and failed.
In this case, his management only weakens your gains.
Last year, Department of Homeland Security officials began lobbying DACA recipients to deport them. The Department of Health and Human Services has made DACA recipients ineligible for health insurance through Obamacare.
And last month, a landmark ruling from the Board of Immigration Appeals, which will apply to immigration judges across the country, said that having DACA is not enough to protect someone from deportation.
A spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said ICE detained 650 DACA recipients between Jan. 20, 2025, and April 30, approximately 90% of whom were charged or convicted of crimes. The spokesperson did not say how many have been fired.
DACA recipient Javier Diaz, center, is welcomed by his neighbors including Martha Avelar, right, in South Los Angeles after returning home from a detention center in Texas in July 2025.
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
But in a February letter to U.S. senators, then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the agency had deported 86 DACA recipients between January 1 and November 19, 2025. Federal judges ordered the agency to bring back others, including Maria de Jesus Estrada Juarez, a Sacramento mother who was deported after her green card interview.
Lawmakers expressed dismay that DACA’s promise of protections is being undermined.
Last month, Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee held a forum on the Trump administration’s “all-out attack on DACA.” In this forum, there was the chief of police in Santa Ana, Mr. Robert Rodriguez, who stated that he was forced to fire the police officer because his work permit renewal was not processed on time.
Last week, House members from California’s Central Valley, including Rep. David Valadao (R-Hanford), sent a letter to the leaders of Homeland Security and Citizenship and Immigration Services, urging them to expedite the processing of DACA.
“Our offices have seen a significant increase in cases involving rehabilitation, with many remaining unresolved for more than six months,” the letter continued. “These extended processing times are creating an avoidable strain on our communities and our economy.”
California has more than a quarter of the nation’s roughly 500,000 DACA recipients, according to figures from Citizenship and Immigration Services. On average, they are 31 years old.
To qualify for DACA, applicants had to pass background checks and meet certain educational or work requirements.
During a news conference before the DACA forum last month, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) pointed to the day in June 2012 when DACA applications first opened. He said parents of immigrant children asked him if it was safe for their children to register for the program, which requires them to acknowledge that they do not have legal status or a home address.
“Are you sure the government won’t use that information against us at some point?” he remembered them saying. “I said, ‘Follow the law exactly as it is written and announced in the executive order, and we will stand with you.
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), front, speaks during a Homeland Security oversight hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee in March.
(J. Scott Applewhite/Associated Press)
“Well, I didn’t expect the current president and what he’s doing now,” Durbin continued.
Sarah Krieger, a former director of Citizenship and Immigration Services who is now a senior policy adviser at the National Immigration Law Center, said the processing delays were caused, in part, by the agency temporarily suspending the automatic process for processing DACA and other applications.
Krieger said the “case review” was closed about a month after Trump took office last year, to study whether each process had adequate security checks. The automated system was reactivated a few months later but was modified to include manual security checks. Krieger left the center last July.
Shutting down the automatic system was “a deliberate decision that does not enhance national security,” he said. “All it does is slow things down.”
Citizenship and Immigration Services recommends that applicants submit their paperwork and pay the $555 fee between 120 and 150 days before their benefits expire.
Among those who did this were two nurses who work for Kaiser Permanente in the Bay Area. Both asked not to be identified because of concerns about their immigration status.
One of the nurses, who came to the US from the Philippines as a child, said she applied for renewal on December 1. Her work permit expired on April 15.
Kaiser put him on 30 days unpaid leave, after which he will be fired. Finally, his work permit was renewed, but only after Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) and two other members of Congress lobbied the federal government on his behalf.
Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) speaks during a news conference on the DACA program on May 12 outside the US Capitol.
(Graeme Sloan/Getty Images)
Padilla said his office has filed applications from hundreds of DACA recipients this year.
Another Kaiser nurse, who also submitted her renewal papers in December, is still waiting. He has taken almost a month of unpaid leave.
A nurse from South America, said another officer of Citizenship and Immigration Services told her that it may take ten months for her renewal to be processed.
The nurse is pregnant and she and her husband have just bought a house. Losing a job could mean losing her health benefits and maternity leave.
“I spent years taking care of others in my community, paying taxes, contributing to the health care system,” he said. “I’ve worked through COVID and it hurts to feel like you’ve been so easily dismissed.”
Another DACA recipient, Elsa Sanchez, 35, of Georgia has maintained DACA status since 2012 and says she always follows the recommendation to submit a renewal application at least 120 days before the expiration date.
The last three renewals, he said, were approved within a week or two. In this case, his work permit and DACA expired on April 1, more than four months after he applied.
Elsa Sanchez, her work permit expired due to DACA renewal delays, at her home in Atlanta.
(Emilie Megnien/Associated Press)
The healthcare IT company where Sanchez works as a senior customer success manager allowed him to take 60 days of unpaid leave but said he would have to terminate his employment after that.
Sanchez’s unpaid leave was set to expire on June 1. On May 20, he received notice that his DACA renewal had finally been approved. But then Sanchez, a single mom, had to withdraw money from her 19-year-old daughter’s college savings account, who is attending a local university. He put this money toward rent and food, about $2,000.
“I feel relieved and grateful,” he said in an Instagram video announcing the news. “I know many of us are still affected by this delay. I wish I could share with you all my approval and that we will all be celebrating today.”
Others have turned to social media to share their knowledge and exchange resources. Madrigal, a disbarred lawyer, is dedicated to making videos every day. On Tuesday, he shared his “35th day of unemployment.”
“Some days it looks like big feelings and uncertainty,” he wrote. “Some days look like walks, chores for the toddlers, cooking dinner and ending the night with tostadas. Trying to find happiness and normalcy in between it all.”
