{"id":35043,"date":"2021-05-05T16:11:19","date_gmt":"2021-05-05T20:11:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=35043"},"modified":"2021-05-21T00:02:31","modified_gmt":"2021-05-21T04:02:31","slug":"obama-dream-act","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What is the DREAM act? Why did Obama propose this legislation? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For Obama, the DREAM act was a top priority. It meant that children brought to the U.S. by undocumented parents would be permanent legal residents and have a path to citizenship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Read more about Obama, the DREAM act, and the struggle to make it a reality. <\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Obama and The DREAM Act<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The final priority for President Obama during the lame-duck session was the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act. This was a proposal to establish permanent legal residence and provide a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants who\u2019d been brought to the United States by their parents as children.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The immigration situation had been a slow-rolling crisis for decades, with 11 million undocumented people in the U.S. by 2010, primarily from Central America, drawn north by economic opportunity. Their presence in the U.S. had become an intense political issue, provoking nativist and xenophobic sentiment on the right, as well as economic concern among labor unions on the left, who feared that undocumented immigrants would lower wages and take jobs away from native-born Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Because of their immigration status, undocumented people were frequently exploited by unscrupulous employers who knew that they had little legal recourse to fight back. For Obama, helping undocumented workers\u2014and especially their non-citizen children\u2014was a simple matter of justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The children of undocumented workers were young men and women (known as \u201cDreamers\u201d) had come to the United States as children through no choice of their own. <\/strong>Growing up in America, the U.S. was the only country they\u2019d known and it was the place where they\u2019d made contributions to their communities, participated in the economy, served in the military, and started families of their own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In talking with Dreamers, Obama learned that many of them hadn\u2019t even known about their immigration status until they\u2019d tried to apply for mortgages or college loans and were asked to provide proof of citizenship. Because of their undocumented status, they were legally at risk of deportation. For Obama, such a fate was monstrously unjust\u2014these young people had no roots in their countries of origin, did not speak the language, and might possibly be exposed to physical danger if they were forced to return.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unfortunately, for Obama and the Dreamers, this bill would be defeated by a coalition of Republicans and conservative Democrats in the Senate. The legislation came tantalizingly close, but ultimately fell five votes short of breaking a filibuster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was one of the bitterest defeats of Obama\u2019s presidency. After the bill\u2019s death, all he could do was meet with a group of Dreamers, hug and comfort them, tell them that America was their <\/em>home too\u2014and that he would never stop fighting for them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is the DREAM act? Why did Obama propose this legislation? For Obama, the DREAM act was a top priority. It meant that children brought to the U.S. by undocumented parents would be permanent legal residents and have a path to citizenship. Read more about Obama, the DREAM act, and the struggle to make it a reality.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":35083,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,275,24],"tags":[274],"class_list":["post-35043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","category-politics","category-society","tag-a-promised-land","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nObama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"For President Obama, the DREAM act was one of the most important pieces of legislation during his first term. Here's why it mattered.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For President Obama, the DREAM act was one of the most important pieces of legislation during his first term. Here's why it mattered.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Shortform Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-05-05T20:11:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-05-21T04:02:31+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"533\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Carrie Cabral\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Carrie Cabral\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Carrie Cabral\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2ababb7c63a94ff5d2190f71dc417d56\"},\"headline\":\"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-05-05T20:11:19+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-05-21T04:02:31+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\"},\"wordCount\":477,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg\",\"keywords\":[\"A Promised Land\"],\"articleSection\":[\"History\",\"Politics\",\"Society\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\",\"name\":\"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future - Shortform Books\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-05-05T20:11:19+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-05-21T04:02:31+00:00\",\"description\":\"For President Obama, the DREAM act was one of the most important pieces of legislation during his first term. Here's why it mattered.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg\",\"width\":800,\"height\":533},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"description\":\"The World's Best Book Summaries\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Shortform Books\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":74,\"caption\":\"Shortform Books\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2ababb7c63a94ff5d2190f71dc417d56\",\"name\":\"Carrie Cabral\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e9aea3c95254368e6bf388b046b35bacb82e4167f4c62c0813620e3a4ec51126?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e9aea3c95254368e6bf388b046b35bacb82e4167f4c62c0813620e3a4ec51126?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Carrie Cabral\"},\"description\":\"Carrie has been reading and writing for as long as she can remember, and has always been open to reading anything put in front of her. She wrote her first short story at the age of six, about a lost dog who meets animal friends on his journey home. Surprisingly, it was never picked up by any major publishers, but did spark her passion for books. Carrie worked in book publishing for several years before getting an MFA in Creative Writing. She especially loves literary fiction, historical fiction, and social, cultural, and historical nonfiction that gets into the weeds of daily life.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/carrie\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future - Shortform Books","description":"For President Obama, the DREAM act was one of the most important pieces of legislation during his first term. Here's why it mattered.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future","og_description":"For President Obama, the DREAM act was one of the most important pieces of legislation during his first term. Here's why it mattered.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/","og_site_name":"Shortform Books","article_published_time":"2021-05-05T20:11:19+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-05-21T04:02:31+00:00","og_image":[{"width":800,"height":533,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/wordpress.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Carrie Cabral","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Carrie Cabral","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/"},"author":{"name":"Carrie Cabral","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2ababb7c63a94ff5d2190f71dc417d56"},"headline":"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future","datePublished":"2021-05-05T20:11:19+00:00","dateModified":"2021-05-21T04:02:31+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/"},"wordCount":477,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg","keywords":["A Promised Land"],"articleSection":["History","Politics","Society"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/","name":"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future - Shortform Books","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg","datePublished":"2021-05-05T20:11:19+00:00","dateModified":"2021-05-21T04:02:31+00:00","description":"For President Obama, the DREAM act was one of the most important pieces of legislation during his first term. Here's why it mattered.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg","width":800,"height":533},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/obama-dream-act\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Obama DREAM Act: Giving All Kids a Future"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","name":"Shortform Books","description":"The World's Best Book Summaries","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#organization","name":"Shortform Books","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/logo-equilateral-with-text-no-bg.png","width":500,"height":74,"caption":"Shortform Books"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/2ababb7c63a94ff5d2190f71dc417d56","name":"Carrie Cabral","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e9aea3c95254368e6bf388b046b35bacb82e4167f4c62c0813620e3a4ec51126?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e9aea3c95254368e6bf388b046b35bacb82e4167f4c62c0813620e3a4ec51126?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Carrie Cabral"},"description":"Carrie has been reading and writing for as long as she can remember, and has always been open to reading anything put in front of her. She wrote her first short story at the age of six, about a lost dog who meets animal friends on his journey home. Surprisingly, it was never picked up by any major publishers, but did spark her passion for books. Carrie worked in book publishing for several years before getting an MFA in Creative Writing. She especially loves literary fiction, historical fiction, and social, cultural, and historical nonfiction that gets into the weeds of daily life.","url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/author\/carrie\/"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/flags-class-citizenship.jpeg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35043"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35043\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":35089,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35043\/revisions\/35089"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}