New Estimates of Unauthorized Youth Eligible for Legal Status under the DREAM Act

This issue brief discusses the major features of the proposed DREAM Act—a provision incorporated into the Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act of 2006 that would extend a six-year conditional legal status to unauthorized youth and a path to eventual permanent legal status if they completed at least two years of higher education or military service within the six-year period. The brief also provides MPI estimates of the number of young persons likely to be eligible for immigration relief if the DREAM Act is signed into law.

According to the MPI calculations and analysis, approximately 360,000 qualifying unauthorized youth—high school graduates between the ages of 18 and 24 in the county for five continuous years—would be immediately eligible for conditional legal status under the Dream Act. The brief predicts that an additional 715,000 unauthorized youth between ages 5 and 17 would become eligible for conditional and then permanent legal status under the proposed legislation sometime in the future.

The authors point out that some conditional residents would be unable or choose not to meet the minimum higher education or military service requirements for adjustment to permanent status. They estimate that about 31,000 of the 360,000 young adults immediately eligible for conditional status would not obtain permanent residency.