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DACA Recipient Dads Celebrate Father's Day And SCOTUS Ruling

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:

There was better news this week for the nearly 650,000 beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program or DACA. The program covers people who came into the country as children and are here illegally. On Thursday, the Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration's attempt to end the program was arbitrary and capricious, which means that DACA recipients, also known as DREAMers, can stay - at least for now. People like Edison Suasnavas, who came to the U.S. with his family from Ecuador when he was 12. He is now a specialist in a molecular oncology lab working with cancer patients in Utah.

EDISON SUASNAVAS: I feel like 90% of us thought, like, we were going to lose that decision in court, but it just gives us hope that whatever pattern they want to choose in Washington to help us out, we'll take it.

MARTIN: Today, Suasnavas is celebrating Father's Day with his 4-year-old daughter and 6-month-old son, both born in the U.S..

SUASNAVAS: I'm just happy that I get to spend it with them this year because in other years, I was so worried that they were going to take away, like, my work permit. So I always worked Father's Day.

MARTIN: In Phoenix, Ariz., another DACA recipient and father of three is grateful for the court's ruling. But on this Father's Day, Jasiel Zambrano is thinking of his own dad who was deported.

JASIEL ZAMBRANO: So it was scary. You know, we never - we didn't think we would ever see him again, just the thought of going back and not having a way to come back, especially when all we know is, you know, all we knew was the culture here. So - and I tell my kids and my wife this, you know, the best father's gift that I have is just having you guys with me, spending every moment with you, you know, waking up, seeing you guys there, cook, you know, a meal here at home. That's enough for me. You know, I told them, I'm a father for you guys, you know, every single day. The fact that we're going to - that's never going to stop.

MARTIN: The thoughts of Jasiel Zambrano and Edison Suasnavas, two DREAMers celebrating a special Father's Day today. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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