Intensified Liminal Legality: The Impact of the
DACA Rescission for Undocumented
Young Adults in Colorado
Peer Review Paper
Elizabeth Fonvergne
PLCY 700: Foundations of Public Policy
Professor Robert Nalbandov
February 12, 2022
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This paper will review the article “Intensified Liminal Legality: The Impact of the DACA Rescission
for Undocumented Young Adults in Colorado”, Burciaga, Edelina M., and Aaron Malone. Law & Social
Inquiry 46, issue 4 (November 2021) 1092-1114.
The undocumented live in an illegal status under United States immigration law. Even in sanctuary
states there is still the possibility of discovery and deportation which creates a juxtaposition for the
undocumented. However, because of the Supreme Court ruling in Phyler v Doe in 1982, and the
implementation of DACA by President Obama in 2012 there is a group of undocumented residents, young
adults brought here by their parents as children, who live in a unique circumstance. This distinctive
situation has been referred to as “liminal legality”, where this group of young people live simultaneously
as documented and undocumented. The core purpose of the study was to show that the uncertainty of
DACA creates not just legal issues, but mental, emotional, physical, economical, and social concerns for
those it purports to help, thereby emphasizing the need for Congress to pass permanent immigration
reform legislation protecting this group.
There are two different categories for research data, quantitative data and qualitative data.
Quantitative data is based on numerical values, things that can be counted. Quantitative data can be
analyzed statistically or by averaging and provide definitive results to specific questions such as “How
much?”, “How long?” “How many?”, etc. Qualitative data is more subjective. Qualitative data is collected
generally by interview and/or questionnaire and observation, then analyzed by the researcher. A lot of
qualitative data centers around feelings, emotions, and perceptions. Analysis of qualitative data relies on
the researcher’s perceptions and opinions. The data for this study was entirely qualitative.
There are a lot of prior studies on the effects of DACA on this group of individuals. Those studies
have shown that regardless of the uncertainty, since being eligible for DACA, recipients reported positive
effects in the social, economic, psychological, and emotional aspects of their lives. Initially it was the
researchers’ intent to look at how undocumented young adults in Colorado were adjusting post DACA
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implementation. At the time of this study, the researchers found they had an exceptional opportunity.
With the election of President Trump, and the announcement of the intent to phase out DACA, the
researchers could question the subject group on their awareness and state of mind regarding an unfolding
situation. For this study the researchers used surveys and interviews to acquire the information they were
seeking. Since the questionnaire portion of both parts of the study were done completely on-line, the
researchers needed to make sure that the respondents were not only legitimate, but also in the state of
Colorado. “In both survey rounds, we offered $20 incentives for completed, valid responses. We took
multiple steps to safeguard the validity of responses, including using anti–ballot stuffing features in the
Qualtrics survey software to prevent multiple responses from a single IP address, using a Captcha test to
prevent automated responses, using a geolocation feature allowing confirmation that responses came
from within Colorado, and finally employing a mix of automated and manual screening to exclude
responses that appeared to be fraudulent, looking for things like extremely short response times,
nonsensical short answer responses, substantial inconsistencies between answers, and copied-and-
pasted text appearing verbatim in multiple responses.”
The first group of respondents were recruited by email only. The return was fifty-seven (57)
questionnaires. In these questionnaires the DACA recipients stated they felt that DACA created positive
impacts on their lives, but they were also aware of the temporary nature and that it could be done away
with at any time.
In an effort to improve the number of respondents in the second round, the researchers
interviewed staff at three (3) immigrant rights organizations and attended two (2) DACA update
community meetings.
Email, Facebook, and flyers were used to engage respondents for the second round. The second
round yielded 122 respondents. In the after-election interviews the thought of losing DACA created
emotional and mental issues. However, while the Trump administration’s attempt to repeal DACA made
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its way through the court the respondents seemed pragmatic in their desire to not dwell on the
uncertainty and concentrate on what was within their control. Because the researchers chose to keep the
surveys anonymous there is no way to know if any, or all, of the respondents in the first round participated
in the second round.
After the compilation of the questionnaire data, there were twenty-eight (28) in-person
interviews from December 2018 to December 2019. In the interviews the subjects were asked questions
specific to the DACA application and renewal process, what they felt were the actual and perceived
benefits of receiving DACA, and around their future plans.
The data analysis of both sets of questionnaires showed that DACA recipients have been aware
and continue to be aware that there are limitations to the program, primarily the fact that it stays
deportation but does not provide any lasting permanence. They all cite their personal perceptions of the
positives and negatives of DACA, what DACA has provided for them, and what their fears are going
forward.
The authors conclude that while DACA provides some protections and rights, its temporary nature
that can be subjected to future executive actions creates liminal legal status for DACA recipients that still
leaves them vulnerable, and the thought of losing DACA creates negative effects on their emotional and
mental health. The only way to eliminate the liminal legal status of DACA recipients is with legislative
reform.
Their ultimate conclusion that there is need now for immigration reform legislation is represented
by this researcher’s note and comment gathered during the interviews: “Even as respondents noted the
limitations of DACA, they confidently exerted their claims to belonging and the need for a permanent fix,
as exemplified by Danira’s comment: “I wish there could be a road to citizenship with DACA. My life is
here, I was not born here but I was brought to the US [when] I was eight months [old]. My country is the
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US, I grew up here, I was taught here. Mexico is my native country and I’m proud to be Mexican, but I
don’t know Mexico.”’
One fault with the study is in the introduction of irrelevant and out of context commentary on
President Trump relative to immigration, and the classification of the Trump administration as “hostile”
toward immigrants. While it is true that President Trump felt that the implementation of DACA was to
circumvent Congress due to their inability to pass immigration reform legislation to protect these children,
he was not unsympathetic to the plight of these now young adults. Rightfully, President Trump believed
that it is Congress’ responsibility to pass immigration reform legislation. It was not his intent to completely
cut off DACA in one fell swoop. He was proposing to phase out DACA over time in hopes that during this
period Congress would in fact act.
The thought that DACA may be taken away without any replacement or new legislation could
certainly create dread and fear in most people. Presenting the demise of DACA in the politically skewed
fashion that most of the major media did at the time, in my opinion, would create, and probably intensify,
those feelings. It is obvious that the researchers conducting this study hold that political partiality. That
they include the following, some of which is propaganda, without context, shows their prejudice: “Trump
also issued a series of immigration-related executive actions to ban travel from Muslim countries, to limit
asylum seekers, and most recently to completely halt immigration in the wake of COVID-19 (Pierce and
Bolter 2020). This reality, coupled with the administration’s nativist and racist rhetoric, policy of family
separation, and workplace raids, created a climate of uncertainty for all undocumented immigrants living
in the United States. For DACA recipients, the announced end of the DACA program underscored the
centrality of liminal legality and specifically undocumented status as a key dimension of ongoing social
stratification, which has detrimental consequences not just for DACA recipients but also for the
communities they call home”. If the subjects were presented only this distorted version of President
Trump’s statement on DACA, then their responses would be expected to be similarly slanted. Since
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qualitative analyses are subjective and rely on the perceptions and judgement of the analysist, if the
analysist inserts personal bias into a qualitative study the results would be suspect.
A second flaw is that they chose to conduct the surveys anonymously. This makes it impossible to
know if anyone from the first round of surveys participated in the second round. I would think that, at a
minimum, having a control group to know how an individual felt after being approved for DACA and then
how their feelings changed after the potential for DACA recission was announced would be paramount
for a qualitative study such as this.
However partial this study may have been, it does not diminish the conclusion of the researchers
that it is long past time for Congress to pass permanent immigration reform legislation in this area.
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