Congressman Conaway Hints at His Desire for Amnesty for DACA's Dreamers

SAN ANGELO, TX — Congressman Michael Conaway, (R)  Midland, held a town hall meeting in San Angelo Tuesday evening.  City Council chambers at the McNease Convention center were full.  

Conaway discussed repealing Obamacare and tax reform before opening the meeting to questions.  There was a lot of discussion about the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or DACA program.  

The Congressman who represents San Angelo said President Trump was right to rescind President Obama’s executive order.  “President Trump’s done the right thing to put it back into Congress’s lap.”  

Conaway told the crowd that Speaker Paul Ryan has set up a task force to address immigration and create legislation to fix it.  “There’s some things I’d like to see in it.  One of them would be if we do come up with a process where they can move into a legal status, that they would not be able to petition to get their parents in under that program because the parents are actually the ones who broke the law.”

Conaway says it’s a complex issue, but “Deporting those kids does not make sense to me,” he said.  “Deporting the ones who are thugs are in gangs or have otherwise broke the law, absolutely.”  

Without using the term amnesty for the Dreamers, the Congressman seemed open to the idea, “I think it’s appropriate to come up with a path that gets them to a legal status of some sort.”  

Conaway says securing the border is the top priority to address illegal immigration. “Everything, DACA included, starts with gaining operational control of the border.  Controlling the border is job one,”  Conaway said.  “We need to control the Visa program within the United States. Forty percent of the folks who are here illegally came by a legal Visa and just stayed.”

Conaway also answered a question about the $20 trillion deficit.  “It has been borrowed or stolen from future generations of Americans.  Our children, grand children, great grandchildren, great great grand children will be paying the interest on that debt.”