Immigrant advocates in Southwest Colorado say they are feeling optimistic after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling Thursday reversed President Donald Trump’s attempt to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

“(This decision) means that DACA recipients and their families can take a deep breath in knowing that they are safe for the time being, and that they no longer have to go to bed at night wondering if their protections against deportation will have been rescinded when they wake up the next day,” Matt Karkut, executive director of Compañeros: Four Corners Immigrant Resource Center, said in an email. “But that doesn’t mean DACA is safe forever.”

Isabelle Garcia, a pseudonym to protect her privacy, is a La Plata County student who has been protected under DACA for 3½ years. She said the ruling opens a new world of possibilities for her future, one where she doesn’t have to accept a restaurant or hospitality job just to make ends meet.

“With this victory, I can just feel like I can go into anything I want,” Garcia said.

Garcia is considering going to college soon, and she says the DACA protection means the difference between worrying about getting a nursing degree that won’t be useful because of her immigration status and getting a biomechanical engineering degree that she could use to become a doctor and help more people.

“I’ve always wanted to go into the medical field, so it just felt like my dreams could actually become something and I could chase them,” Garcia said. “We’re not bad people, we’re just like anyone else, and we want to be your doctor, your lawyer, your nurse – we just want to help.”

The Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision is considered a win for those protected under the program, who were brought to the United States as children and currently have no clear path to citizenship. But lawyers warn that the ruling doesn’t remove the uncertainty of a program that’s meant to be temporary.

“It’s better news than if the program had just been ended this (Thursday) morning, but I’m trying to tell everybody don’t be too excited because this isn’t a permanent pathway,” said Matthew Campbell, an immigration lawyer based in Farmington and Durango.

Writing in her own concurring opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor differed slightly with the majority by arguing that the plaintiffs could “plausibly allege discriminatory animus,” arguing Trump’s statements on the campaign trail calling Mexican immigrants “people that have lots of problems” and “animals” show there are grounds to believe that the decision to end DACA was discriminatory.

“I would not so readily dismiss the allegation that an executive decision disproportionately harms the same racial group that the president branded as less desirable mere months earlier,” Sotomayor wrote.

The court ultimately decided the Trump administration did not correctly follow the Administrative Procedure Act, which provides guidelines about how an executive agency like the Department of Homeland Security, which runs the DACA program, could take back protections.

The DACA program, and so-called DREAMers, generally enjoy broad support from the American public. Most of those protected as part of DACA were brought to the U.S. as children and have since married, found jobs and otherwise built lives in the U.S. An overwhelming 83% of Americans support giving those protected by DACA a path to citizenship, according to a 2018 Gallup poll.

Because of the technical nature of the Supreme Court decision, Congress still must act in order to create any permanent solutions for the about 700,000 DACA recipients.

“There needs to be a more permanent solution one way or the other,” Campbell said. “I think it’s inherently wrong to hold an entire group or entire population at legislative whim.”

In separate statements, both Sens. Cory Gardner and Michael Bennet indicated they would support the American Dream and Promise Act, which would make DACA protections permanent. The act previously passed the House of Representatives in June 2019, but it awaits action in the Senate. Rep. Scott Tipton, R-Cortez, voted against the bill in the House.

Garcia said that if she could speak to lawmakers, she would urge them to consider DACA recipients like her as people first.

“I would say just think of us, we could be one of your best friends and you wouldn’t even know we’re under the DACA status,” Garcia said. “We’re just trying to contribute back to our home, that’s the only place we’ve ever known.”

Jacob Wallace is a graduate student at American University in Washington, D.C., and an intern for The Durango Herald and The Journal.