Immigrants who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children were among more than 200 demonstrators who gathered outside a federal courthouse in New Orleans where appellate judges heard arguments over a policy shielding them from deportation.

Mexican-born filmmaker Jorge Xolalpa is mired in a years-long battle over whether he can keep working legally in the United States.

‘Dreamers,' long a symbol of immigrant youth, are increasingly easing into middle age as eligibility requirements have been frozen since 2012, when the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program was introduced.

The Biden administration has unveiled a regulation aimed at fending off legal challenges to a decade-old program that shields immigrants from deportation if they arrived as young children.

(AP Photo/Evan Vucci)SAN DIEGO – For the opening salvo of his presidency, few expected Joe Biden to be so far-reaching on immigration. He also extended temporary legal status to Liberians who fled civil war and the Ebola outbreak to June 2022. Former President Donald Trump's administration also took hundreds of other steps to enhance enforcement, limit eligibility for asylum and cut legal immigration. The survey of more than 110,000 voters in November showed 9 in 10 Biden voters but just about half of Trump voters were in favor of a path to legal status. Biden's bill calls for more technology at land crossings, airports and seaports and authorizes the Homeland Security secretary to consider other steps.

FILE - In this Nov. 12, 2019, file photo people rally outside the Supreme Court over President Trump's decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), at the Supreme Court in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)HOUSTON – A federal judge did not immediately issue a ruling following a court hearing Tuesday on the fate of a U.S. program shielding immigrants brought to the country illegally as children. The states also argued that DACA illegally awards benefits such as work authorization to recipients and has increased states' costs, including $250 million a year for social services to DACA recipients in Texas. President-elect Joe Biden has pledged to protect DACA, but a ruling against the program could limit his ability to keep the program or something similar in place. In 2015, Hanen ruled Obama could not expand DACA protections or institute a program shielding their parents.

The Trump administration has fully restored the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program for immigrants brought to the U.S. as youth, complying with a federal judge's order. Arguing in favor of the program is a coalition of DACA recipients, represented by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund. MALDEF argues that Texas and the other states lack standing, the ground on which the Supreme Court dismissed the state's election challenge. Advocates are calling for Congress to pass permanent protections for immigrants brought to the U.S. as youths. Opponents of the program argue that Obama illegally circumvented Congress months before his 2012 re-election and that he failed to follow federal procedure in establishing the program.

U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis said the government had to post a public notice within three days — including on its website and the websites of all other relevant government agencies — that new DACA applications were being accepted. Garaufis also ordered the government to put together a status report on the DACA program by Jan. 4. “Every time the outgoing administration tried to use young immigrants as political scapegoats, they defiled the values of our nation. The Trump administration had announced the end of the program in 2017, leading to the legal challenges that wound up in front of the Supreme Court. For the second time, a court has ordered the administration to resume processing DACA applications.

WASHINGTON President Donald Trump is promising new executive action on immigration as he returns to the defining issue of his administration. Elsewhere in the interview, Trump said he would instead be signing a big executive order that would include DACA. Were working out the legal complexities right now, but Im going to be signing a very major immigration bill as an executive order," he said. White House spokesman Judd Deere quickly tried to walk back the meandering comments, saying that Trump was working on an executive order to establish a merit-based immigration system to further protect U.S. In addition to his complaints about illegal immigration, Trump has long railed against the country's legal immigration system, saying it should favor high-skilled immigrants admitted for their merit' instead of those with family connections.

Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipient Roberto Martinez, left, celebrates with other DACA recipients in front of the Supreme Court on Thursday, June 18, 2020, in Washington. The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected President Donald Trumps effort to end legal protections for 650,000 young immigrants, a stunning rebuke to the president in the midst of his reelection campaign. The high court on Thursday ruled that President Donald Trump improperly ended the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program in 2017. The ruling means young immigrants can keep working, providing for their families and making a difference in this country," she said. Reyna Montoya, a DACA recipient from the Phoenix area who leads an immigrant rights advocacy organization, said she and others will keep pushing Congress to take up legislation addressing young immigrants.

The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected President Donald Trumps effort to end legal protections for 650,000 young immigrants, a stunning rebuke to the president in the midst of his reelection campaign. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)WASHINGTON President Donald Trump says he will renew his administration's effort to end legal protections for young immigrants after Supreme Court blocked the first try. In a tweet Friday morning, Trump said, The Supreme Court asked us to resubmit on DACA, nothing was lost or won. The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld legal protections for young immigrants, but President Donald Trump could still take away the ability for hundreds of thousands of them to live and work legally in the United States. The ruling means young immigrants can keep working, providing for their families and making a difference in this country," she said.

Even with his worries, Batalla Vidal is hopeful immigrants like him will be able to stay in the country. The protections remain in effect at least until the U.S. Supreme Court issues its decision, which will likely be in 2020. The U.S. Supreme Court in June agreed to hear the administration's appeal of Batalla Vidal's and other cases from around the country. On Tuesday, he will sit at the Supreme Court to hear oral arguments. Batalla Vidal also joined Make the Road New York, a nonprofit group that defends immigrant rights.

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments Tuesday about President Donald Trump's attempt to end the program, and the stakes are particularly high for the older generation of people enrolled in Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, known as DACA. DACA recipients are often thought of as college students, but as the 7-year-old policy has aged, so have its beneficiaries. Roughly 18% of the 669,000 people enrolled in DACA are 31 and older. The immigrants hope that the Supreme Court case will bring an end to a long period of legal limbo. If the Supreme Court sides with the Trump administration, it would throw the lives of DACA recipients back into type of limbo they regularly experienced before the program.