Obama's immigration announcement met with relief, disappointment in Minneapolis

Some immigrant families in Minneapolis took in President Obama's immigration announcement Thursday night with excitement — and some disappointment.

• Related: Obama spurns GOP with expansive immigration orders

The president's plan could help nearly 5 million people who are living in the United States without paperwork avoid deportation.

"As part of his executive action, Obama said he would defer deportation of parents whose children are either U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents and have lived in the United States for at least five years; expand similar protection to children who entered the country illegally with their parents; and allow those groups to work in the United States legally once they have passed a background check and paid a fee."

At South Minneapolis' El Colegio Charter School, about 40 people filled the lunchroom to watch the president's address. The crowd, many from a group called NAVIGATE, a leadership organization for young immigrants, listened quietly.

For some people in the room, it was just the news they'd been waiting for. Daniel del Toro is 36. His two children were born in the United States.

"I woke up thinking I could be put in jail and removed from their side at any point," he said. "I have lived in fear for far too long. Now I can imagine driving and working without having to worry about someone coming for me. Now I can imagine feeling safe for once in my own house."

Elsa Mimbrera Flores listened to the president with her 16-year-old daughter, Jennifer Munoz, who was born in the United States. The mother wiped a tear as the president spoke.

She's relieved for her own situation, she said, but the relief came too late for her brother, who was deported in 2010. Immigration and Customs Enforcement deported nearly 6,000 people from the region that includes Minnesota that year. Fewer than half had criminal convictions.

Deportations reached historic highs in the early years of the Obama administration. In 2011, Obama scaled back and refocused on deporting criminals and recent border-crossers.

So far this year, ICE has deported 1,900 people from the region. Eighty percent had criminal convictions.

Obama reiterated that priority in his speech, saying enforcement would focus on "felons, not families; criminals, not children."

While the announcement was met with some relief among the El Colegio group, others across Minneapolis weren't so happy.

"I'm concerned with the honesty of all this," said Linda Huhn, a member of NumbersUSA, which seeks to limit immigration. "I am concerned about Minnesota residents — legal residents, citizens and legal immigrants, perhaps — maybe not getting a job when someone who came here illegally took the job."

Huhn said she is opposed to the president's decision to let people stay who broke the rules in the first place.

"His whole speech made me angry," she said. "I just had to take a deep breath."

It's unclear how many people living in Minnesota could benefit from Thursday's executive action.

Recent estimates from two groups put the number of unauthorized immigrants in Minnesota at more than 90,000. One of those groups, the Migration Policy Institute, estimates about a third of those are the parent of at least one U.S.-born child.

Correction (Nov. 10, 2016): An earlier version of this story misidentified the 2012 the executive order called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.