On that day, unless Congress takes action, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals will expire. They will face deportation to countries where many of them have no family or friends and might never have visited since leaving as children. Sens. Jim Inhofe and James Lankford must take action to extend DACA before it expires and ends life as they know it for more than 6,000 Oklahoma residents.

Our senators claim they are committed to families and children and to maintaining the United States’ role as world leader. By irresponsibly ignoring DACA and the thousands of Oklahomans who rely on it to study, work and participate in their communities (in Inhofe’s case) or proposing additional onerous requirements (in Lankford’s), they are betraying those commitments.

DACA recipients arrived as children, often growing up without ever knowing they were not citizens. They voluntarily submit their identification and residency information every year, complying with immigration law. They are already home. Ending their protections means sending them to foreign countries, without the support of their families. It means separating parents and children. It means banishing some of the most upstanding members of our community.

There are more than 6,000 DACA recipients living in Oklahoma, and their deportation to countries they do not know would have a real negative impact on our state. They would leave behind families, jobs, classes and communities. To be sure, we should not encourage people to make the dangerous journey to cross the border without authorization or send their children to do so on their own. But extending DACA is not a reward for breaking the law: it represents the best parts of U.S. policy and humanity. The Dreamers who benefit from DACA are not political tools for teaching desperate people a lesson.

Julie Ward, Ph.D, is an assistant professor of Spanish at the University of Oklahoma.