U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has been accepting “Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” (DACA) applications for just over two months. As of October 10, USCIS has received almost 180,000 applications and has approved 4,591 applications. Large numbers of young Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders are applying – over 7,400 as of September 12. So far the greatest numbers of AAPI applicants have been Korean, Filipino and Indian.
The Asian American Center for Advancing Justice has compiled numerous DACA resources, including a video of a recent webinar for API DREAMers: http://www.advancingequality.org/deferred-action-for-dreamers
In addition, USCIS now has the “How Do I Request Consideration for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals” in four Asian languages:
http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/Resources/daca-korean.pdf
http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/Resources/daca-chinese.pdf
http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/Resources/daca-tagalog.pdf
http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/Resources/daca-viet.pdf
Also, immigrants who think they may qualify for such relief can contact the Los Angeles-based Asian Pacific American Law Center (APALC) for questions and free direct assistance at (888) 349-9695 and info@apalc.org. In addition, APALC can provide assistance in the following languages:
Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese) – (800) 520-2356
Khmer – (800) 867-3126
Korean – (800) 867-3640
Thai – (800) 914-9583
Vietnamese – (800) 267-7395
Immigrants also can contact the San Francisco-based ALC at (415) 896-1701 and alc@asianlawcaucus.org.
