Today is the last day for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients to submit their renewal applications, exactly one month after President Donald Trump's administration repealed the program.
The only persons eligible for the latest renewals were those whose work permits expired between September 5 and March 5, 2018.
In order to process the cases, the forms and corresponding fees had to be physically at the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) offices today.
According to USCISAs of Tuesday, October 3, of the approximately 154,200 eligible to renew DACA, just over 106,000 have renewal applications in process or have already been approved. That means that 48,000 eligible youth had not yet submitted their renewals. However, it is quite possible that many of those applications were received between yesterday and today.
USCIS indicates that approximately 4,000 DACA enrollees who had not yet submitted their renewals live in areas affected by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria.
Elaine Duke, the Acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, said that some exceptions may be made for late renewals received only from eligible beneficiaries in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands:
"With respect to the devastation of Hurricane Maria and the lack of communications and infrastructure for an extended period of time, I have asked USCIS to consider on a case-by-case basis the DACA applications received from U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico residents. As of today, fewer than 20 DACA recipients from the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI) and Puerto Rico have yet to renew with USCIS.
This afternoon, USCIS sent out a tweet reaffirming the possible extension of late re-registrations from the two U.S. territories.
Live in Puerto Rico or USVI? We'll consider deadline extensions of your #DACA application on case by case basis. DHS Gov
- USCIS (@USCIS) October 5, 2017