Advocates were counting on Democrats to force Republicans to guarantee a protected future for undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children during negotiations surrounding the US government shutdown.
But the American government was open on Tuesday morning after a three-day closure without any concrete protections for those often called “Dreamers”.
The closure began Friday at midnight after Republicans and Democrats couldn’t come to an agreement on the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals programme (DACA), the Obama-era policy that protected Dreamers from deportation.
President Donald Trump ended DACA in September, saying he would reinstate protections in exchange for funding for a wall on the US-Mexico border and increased militarisation of immigration enforcement authorities – two election campaign promises.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a Democrat, agreed to pass a short-term funding bill to keep the government open until February 8 after Majority Leader Mitch McConnell promised to discuss continued protections for DACA recipients.
“We are furious to see that Democrats were the first ones to cave. We thought they had finally grown a backbone,” Paul Quinonez, a Dreamer and activists from Washington state, told Al Jazeera. “Instead, we saw them deliver a victory to the Republican Party in exchange for vague promises.”
Trump and some Republicans have called the shutdown a “failure” for Democrats.
The three-day negotiation period was a missed opportunity, wherein “Democrats let a historic moment go to waste in exchange for more time,” he added.
Some Republicans have shown a willingness to pass a version of the DREAM Act. In September, shortly after Trump rescinded DACA, three Senators introduced the Succeed Act, a version more “friendly” to Republicans.
The Succeed Act offered a 15-year path to citizenship and featured provisions similar to those of DACA.
Other provisions blocked beneficiaries from sponsoring relatives to come to the US, which the Trump administration calls “chain migration” and the president is firmly against.
Still, immigrant advocates still see a possibility for a version of the DREAM Act in the near future.