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Immigration hard-liners are holding their fire against President Trump's decision to keep an Obama administration program allowing young dreamers who entered the country illegally to remain.

Trump is generally clamping down on immigration enforcement, implementing policies that could cause a dramatic wave in deportations.

But he has explicitly avoided canceling President Obamas Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which has allowed about 750,000 young people brought to the United States illegally as children to get permission to stay and work in this country.

The decision was a disappointment to groups who hoped to end the program.

Conservative lawmakers who campaigned on tougher immigration policies say they want to hear more from Trump before jumping to conclusions.

With all the fake news he is countering on a daily basis, I think he is just being pragmatic. And right now, I hope we can focus on ObamaCare repeal, said Rep. Dave Brat (R-Va.), a Tea Party darling.

Brat said its possible more could be coming.

Attorney General Jeff SessionsJeff SessionsGovernor: NY will protect transgender students DeVos responds to revoked transgender protections: Example of Obama admin 'overreach' ACLU: Trump action wont stop transgender teen's lawsuit MORE was finally put in place a couple weeks ago, so I think we have to be realistic, he added. I will wait to see how he addresses it. He is very big on keeping his word.

Dan Stein, president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, said leaving DACA untouched for the moment would give the administration leeway to negotiate immigration reform in the Senate if you assume that Trump is interested in getting some legislative action from Congress.

Theyre the negotiating tool, he said.

Trump promised to end DACA on the campaign trail, but he has also spoken sympathetically of those who benefit from the program.

Last week, Trump said DACA is a very, very difficult subject that had to be dealt with with heart.

You have these incredible kids, in many cases, not in all cases. In some of the cases theyre having DACA and theyre gang members and theyre drug dealers too, he said. But you have some absolutely incredible kids ... they were brought here in such a way, its a very, very tough subject, said Trump.

GOP leaders have also spoken positively about the program.

In January, Speaker Paul RyanPaul RyanCornyn: Border wall 'makes absolutely no sense' in some areas CNN to host town hall featuring John McCain, Lindsey Graham GOP senator won't vote to defund Planned Parenthood MORE (R-Wis.) told an undocumented woman brought to the United States as a child that she would not face deportation.

What we have to do is find a way to make sure that you can get right with the law. And weve got to do this so that the rug doesnt get pulled out from under you and your family gets separated," said Ryan.

That said, its unclear if the administration is committed to keeping the program indefinitely.

Asked whether a decision on DACA could come any day, White House press secretary Sean Spicer on Tuesday said, Yes, exactly.

Activists are angry over the detention of Daniel Ramirez Medina, a dreamer in Seattle accused of having accepted gang membership. Ramirez's lawyer said he was pressured by federal agents to falsely admit affiliation.

Proponents of the program are worried that the Medina case is a sign of things to come.

Under DACA, recipients received a two-year renewable work permit.While the program remains in the books, new applicants would have to provide the federal government with personal information and an admission of being in the country illegally. One of the hurdles the program faced under Obama was getting applicants to trust that the information wouldn't be used against them.

Medinas detention, as a result, could become an argument for not signing up for the program.

Opponents of DACA see it as a way of slowly killing off the program.

Its one thing to say that were not going to deport people who have received DACA documents, but its another to give out renewals, said Beck.

Letting it expire is different than immediately rescinding it, said Stein. Theres something to be said in a policy that allows a transition.

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Immigration hard-liners hold fire on 'dreamers' program | TheHill - The Hill

Its been a long and winding road, this journey to craft effective immigration policy in the U.S., and one that has encountered not a few dead-ends along the way.

Experts say the modern debate over immigration has its roots in a 1986 law signed by President Ronald Reagan, which enabled 3 million people in the country illegally to attain legal status. It became known as the Reagan Amnesty.

There were promises of a new era of enforcement, and strict adherence to a law barring employers from hiring workers who didnt have permission to work in the U.S. But they were never fully realized.

Revisions were completed in 1990 under PresidentGeorge H.W. Bush and in 1996 under President Bill Clinton. Still there was dissatisfaction.

In the 2000s, Republican President George W. Bush proposed a comprehensive immigration reform package. That went nowhere. Democratic President Barack Obama also tried and failed to steer something through both houses of Congress.

In the absence of reform, there have been persistent cries that the system is broken. Against that backdrop, Donald Trump road a tidal wave of discontent all the way to the White House. And on Tuesday, the president gave the clearest indication yet where he is going on immigration, when it was announced federal authorities would deportanyone convicted of any criminal offense, whether serious or minor.

Trump is not only different from Obama, he is very different from George W. Bush, saidKarthick Ramakrishnan, UC Riverside professor and associate dean of the universitys School of Public Policy.

Experts suggested that both Bush and Obama were tough in their approach to enforcing immigration laws. Deportations reached 2 million under Bush and exceeded 2.5 million the most of any president under Obama.

Obama was not called the deporter-in-chief by accident, saidRamakrishnan, who authored a book titled, The New Immigration Federalism.

Yet, said Jack Pitney, a government professor at Claremont-McKenna College, They were both broadly sympathetic to immigration and not wanting to deport millions of undocumented immigrants.

Manuel Pastor, USC professor of sociology and director of the universitys Center for the Study of Immigrant Integration, saidBush set the stage for Obama tried to do later.

Bush was a border governor and had a great deal of familiarity with immigrants in his own state, Pastor said.

At the same time, Bush sought to bolster the GOPs outreach to Latino voters, he said.

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But then something called 9/11 happened. The response to the nations deadliest terror attack consumed Bushs agenda, and immigration became predominantly a national security issue.

When youre worrying about whether your gardener is illegal, thats different than worrying about whether the person sitting on the airplane next to you is illegal, Pastor said.

In his second term, Bush circled back and tried to push forward a program for immigration reform.That ran into a buzz-saw of opposition from conservatives and also from trade unions who were worried about competition, he said.

Then, when Obama leaped onto the scene, Pitney said, he vowed to deliver comprehensive immigration reform as well. But, like Bushs, Obamas plan was abruptly reshaped by a earth-shattering event early on: the worst economic crisis to hammer the country since the Great Depression, he said.

Pastor saidObama was absorbed with trying to rescue the economy, expand health care and reform immigration.

He focused on the first two and squandered a lot of political capital, Pastor said.

Meanwhile, Obama stepped up deportations, he said.

Pastor said Obama believed that, if he signaled he was tough on enforcement, hed garner political support to pass reform legislation. And he managed to persuade the Senate to pass a bill in 2013.

It got bottled up in the House, he said.

Frustrated with the roadblock in Congress, Obama signed an executive order in 2014 providinga legal reprieve for undocumented parents of U.S. citizens.

And here we are today.

What Trump is doing now is dramatically increasing the number of people who are going to get targeted for deportation, Ramakrishnan said.

He said the president set the stage for many more deportations than were processed under either Obama or Bush.

Ramakrishnan said the stepped-up enforcement comes when the undocumented population is stable: There are an estimated 11 million living in this country, as many as were here a decade ago.

The Pew Research Center and the Public Policy Institute of California say more than 10 percent 1.3 million reside counties Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

Because the population is stable, Pastor said, todays community is different than a decade ago. In 2008, he said, 40 percent of undocumented immigrants had been here a decade. Today, 60 percent have been here that long.

And, he said,Heavy removal is much more likely to affect a family now someone who has kids, someone who has a home, someone who is a neighbor, someone who has had a job for a very long time.

Pitney it is unclear how the administrations policy will play out.

With Donald Trump, the one certainty is that what he says and what he does is not always the same thing, said Pitney. But already he has taken a tougher approach to immigration than his predecessors.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Immigration reform failures set stage for Trump's strategy - San Bernardino County Sun

Dan Stein Published 7:25 p.m. ET Feb. 21, 2017 | Updated 13 hours ago

President Trump and Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly(Photo: Evan Vucci, AP)

While the Trump administration is busy fulfilling the presidents promise to protect the interests of the American people and enforce our immigration laws, the news media are fixated on the fate of illegal aliens who enjoy temporary protection under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

DACA was an overly broad and unconstitutional exercise of executive power by President Obama that would likely have been struck down by the courts had it been challenged. In addition to being unconstitutional, DACA also triggered a surge of illegal immigration of unaccompanied minors and families with children in tow. The message it sent was that coming to the U.S. illegally, or bringing children here illegally, would be rewarded.

However much people might empathize with the situation of DACA recipients, we must make it clear that the responsibility for their circumstances rests with the parents who knowingly violated our laws and put their children in this situation. In every other area of law, we hold lawbreakers accountable for any negative consequences to family members, and immigration law should not be the exception.

Early Trump administration actions seem to indicate that the 750,000 DACA recipients will be allowed to maintain their two-year deferments until they lapse, at which point they will revert to their earlier status. The president has pledged to review the situation of this group of illegal aliens but not before making good on decades of broken promises to the American people.

Allowing the program to lapse does not mean that DACA recipients will be targeted for removal, but they would no longer be exempted from enforcement or be eligible for work authorization. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly defined seven categories of aliens who will be priorities for removal. Most DACA recipients would not fall into those categories.

Immigration crackdown reality check: Our view

Most important, by demonstrating the resolve to enforce immigration laws, President Trump is deterring others from putting their children in this difficult situation.

Dan Stein is president of the Federation for American Immigration Reform, a non-profit group that favors more restrictive immigration policies.

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Let DACA program lapse: Opposing view - USA TODAY

MORRISVILLE, N.C. (WNCN) As part of National Day of Action, Research Triangle Park leaders called for immigration reform.

To do that, local leaders are showing off new research on the contributions immigrants have in the Triangle.

Leaders said global talent promotes many of the businesses in RTP.

Research found that in the 2nd congressional district nearly 9 percent of the areas population are foreign-born residents.

The numbers also show immigrants held $1.6 billion in spending power in 2014.

Immigrants are also nearly 52-percent more likely to be entrepreneurs than the native population.

I would like Congress and any immigration bill to accelerate the path of citizenship with those that have skilled visa programs so we can remain competitive, Morrisville Mayor Pro-Tem Steve Rao said. We dont entrepreneurs going to Canada or Europe we want them to come to America.

This event focused on immigration reform and technology. Another event will be held on agriculture later this week.

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RTP leaders call for immigration reform - WNCN

SALT LAKE CITY One Utah lawmaker borrowed part of a President Donald Trump campaign quote Tuesday as he advocated for immigration reform, saying Congress needs to build a door into its immigration policy.

Members of Utah's faith and business community joined with state lawmakers to call upon Congress to promote immigration reform. Over a dozen speakers from various backgrounds shared their experiences hiring and working with immigrants, and stressed the difficulties of doing business with a workforce that is growing concerned about its place in the country.

The speakers organized with New American Economy, an organization promoting the economic contributions of immigrants. They cited recent immigration and workforce figures to demonstrate immigrants' contributions to the nation's economy.

Rep. Mike Winder, R-West Valley City, advocated for entrepreneurial involvement by immigrants to the U.S. and said immigrants bring $4 billion in spending power to the state of Utah.

"President Donald Trump, in the recent campaign, talked about building a wall. You may have heard of it," Winder said. "But he also talked about a big beautiful door in that wall."

He made note of the broad involvement of immigrants in the country, from agricultural workers to Nobel Prize laureates.

Winder was joined by Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, and Sen. Todd Weiler, R-Woods Cross, as they discussed Utah's involvement in immigration programs.

Stephenson cited Utah's early adoption of the DREAM Act, which allows undocumented children to attend colleges with in-state tuition, as one example of Utah's efforts in assisting immigrant needs. He also cited Utah's dual-language immersion program as another method that has helped immigrant students and families adjust to life in the state.

Weiler made note of the nearly 70,000 immigrants in his congressional district who make up around 10 percent of the area's population and who contributed about $115 million in state and local taxes and $224 million in federal taxes in 2015.

"Immigrants are innovators who really help drive our economy forward," he said.

Steven Klemz, a pastor for the Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church, discussed his concerns over members of his congregation expressing fears about deportation.

"One proprietor, because of the fear in this country, is closing down his business. He has asked that if they get detained or deported, I take his two children to Mexico," the pastor said.

A number of speakers stressed support for reforming immigration policies, ahead of concerns about Trump's proposal to build a wall along the southern border of the country.

Jorge Dennis, the CEO of EnviroKleen and a member of Utah's Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, supports what he says is a moderate and centered approach.

"The issue of immigration has been used by both parties as a partisan weapon to throw back and forth for reasons of their advantage," Dennis said, adding that the entry system for the country needs to be updated to allow people to more easily work within the country.

"We must come up with a system that will allow for these good people to come out of the shadows and continue to make positive impacts in our communities but also to vet out those who would seek to do us harm," he said.

A number of business leaders shared their hopes for work visa reforms to better staff their businesses.

Melva Sine, CEO of the Utah Restaurant Association, said many visa workers are able to contribute to the business industry but encounter problems when they have to renew visas, and face anxieties about fears of deportation.

"Im hoping that this big beautiful door that we are referring to becomes a big beautiful revolving door," she said.

Jake Harward, owner of Harward Farms, said the H2A visa program for temporary agricultural workers is one program needing reform.

"The H2A program is very cumbersome, very expensive. It takes a long time to get my workers here by the month of May. I have to start my process in December," Harward said.

He said hiring his summertime workforce is a process that could be streamlined to the benefit of local farmers.

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Utah leaders call for immigration reform, cite contributions of immigrants - Deseret News