Trump administration ends legal protections for half-million Haitians who now face deportations
MIAMI (AP) — The Department of Homeland Security said Friday that it is terminating legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Haitians, setting them up for potential deportation.
DHS said that conditions in Haiti have improved and Haitians no longer meet the conditions for the temporary legal protections.
The termination of temporary protected status, or TPS, applies to about 500,000 Haitians who are already in the United States, some of whom have lived here for more than a decade. It is coming three months after the Trump administration revoked legal protections for thousands of Haitians who arrived legally in the country under a humanitarian parole program, and it is part of part of a series of measures implemented to curb immigration.
Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a federal judge's order preventing the administration from revoking the parole program.
TPS allows people already in the United States to stay and work legally if their homelands are deemed unsafe. Immigrants from 17 countries, including Haiti, Afghanistan, Sudan and Lebanon, were receiving those protections before President Donald Trump took office for his second term in January.
President Trump is ending protections and programs for immigrants as part of his mass deportations promises. During his political campaign he said his administration would scale back the use of TPS, which covered more than 1 million immigrants. His campaign highlighted unfounded claims that Haitians who live and work legally in Springfield, Ohio, as TPS holders were eating their neighbors' pets.
Hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans and some Afghans have been told already that they're losing their TPS status.
Some of the Haitians who benefit from TPS have requested asylum or other lawful immigration status that could protect them from deportation, although it is not clear how many could be left without any relief.
'This decision restores integrity in our immigration system and ensures that Temporary Protective Status is actually temporary,' a DHS spokesperson said. 'The environmental situation in Haiti has improved enough that it is safe for Haitian citizens to return home.'
The Department of State, nonetheless, has not changed its travel advisory and still recommends Americans 'do not travel to Haiti due to kidnapping, crime, civil unrest, and limited health care.'
Temporary protected status for Haitians expires on Aug. 3, and the termination will be effective on Sept. 2, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said.
DHS advised TPS holders to return to Haiti using a mobile application called CBP Home.
Gang violence has displaced 1.3 million people across Haiti as the local government and international community struggle to contain an spiraling crisis, according to a recent report from the International Organization for Migration. The report warned of a 24% increase in displaced people since December, with gunmen having chased 11% of Haiti's nearly 12 million inhabitants from their home.
'Deporting people back to these conditions is a death sentence for many, stripping them of their fundamental right to safety and dignity,' said Tessa Pettit, a Haitian-American who is executive director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition.
Frantz Desir, 36, has been in the U.S. since 2022 on asylum, but he says he is concerned by the Trump administration's decision to terminate TPS.
'You see your friends who used to go to work every day, and suddenly—without being sick or fired—they just can't go anymore. It hits you. Even if it hasn't happened to you yet, you start to worry, 'What if it's me next?''
——-
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Fox News
7 minutes ago
- Fox News
Trump golfs with Republican senators Schmitt, Graham and Paul ahead of 'Big, Beautiful Bill' vote
President Donald Trump played a round of golf with Republican leaders on Saturday. The president was joined by Sen. Eric Schmitt, R-Mo., Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-SC., Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and CIA Director John Ratcliffe, sources confirmed to Fox News. The outing comes as Republican senators look to pass the "Big Beautiful Bill" by Saturday afternoon. The bill has a self-imposed deadline of July 4. In a memo sent on Saturday to Senate offices, the White House endorsed the latest revisions to the bill and called for its passage, while warning that failure to approve the budget "would be the ultimate betrayal". Graham shared the golf outing in a post on social media, expressing optimism over the bill's vote. Graham revealed the stitched-together text of the colossal bill late Friday night. Republican leaders, the White House and disparate factions within the Senate and House GOP have been meeting to find middle ground on other pain points, such as tweaking the caps on state and local tax (SALT) deductions. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent hammered on the importance of passing Trump's bill on time. He met with Senate Republicans during their closed-door lunch and spread the message that advancing the colossal tax package would go a long way toward giving businesses more certainty in the wake of the president's tariffs. "We need certainty," he said. "With so much uncertainty, and having the bill on the president's desk by July 4 will give us great tax certainty, and I believe, accelerate the economy in the third quarter of the year." Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Boston Globe
8 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
Senate Republicans revise Trump's policy bill, scrounging for votes to pass it
Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up Republican leaders in the Senate are rushing to shore up support for the legislation so they can quickly pass it and send it to the House for final approval in time to meet the July 4 deadline Trump has set. An initial vote in the Senate could come later Saturday. Advertisement Party leaders are trying to appease two flanks of their conference. Some, including Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, said they could not support it without greater reassurances that the Medicaid cuts it contains would not hurt rural hospitals in their states. And fiscal hawks, including Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, have said they do not want to back legislation that would only increase the deficit. Advertisement The core of the bill remains the same. It would extend tax cuts passed by Republicans in 2017 and add some new ones Trump campaigned on, while slashing spending on safety-net programs, including Medicaid and food assistance. The biggest tax cuts and the biggest changes to those anti-poverty programs remained intact. Taken together, the bill would likely increase federal debt by more than $3 trillion over the next decade, though lawmakers are still shaping the bill and waiting on an official estimate from the Congressional Budget Office. With Trump demanding quick action, Republicans in Congress have intensified their efforts to push it through to enactment even as many of them — including several who voted for it in the House — have been open about their reservations about a measure they are concerned could be a political loser. The revisions released early Saturday were designed to allay some of those concerns. Senators, including Tillis and Susan Collins, R-Maine, had pressed for the inclusion of a rural hospital fund to help health care providers absorb the impact of a provision that would crack down on strategies that many states have developed to finance their Medicaid programs. Despite their pushback, that provider tax change remains in the bill, though lawmakers have delayed its implementation by one year. It is unclear whether a $25 billion compensation fund will be enough to win their votes. Collins had suggested that she wanted to provide as much as $100 billion to ensure that rural hospitals, which operate on thin margins, were not adversely affected. Advertisement But it appeared to be enough to win over at least one Republican holdout who had expressed concern about the Medicaid cuts — Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, who said he would vote for the bill and was confident that changes benefit his state at least in the short term. A new provision allowing 'individuals in a noncontiguous state' to be exempt from enforcing new work requirements imposed on SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, appeared aimed at mollifying Murkowski of Alaska. Her state would be hit with billions of dollars in nutrition assistance costs as a result of the legislation, and she had cited the provision as one of her chief concerns. The bill also includes new health provisions designed to benefit Alaska, as well as new tax benefits for fishers in the state's waters. Some of the changes were aimed at appealing to members of the House, where Republicans from high-tax states like New York have threatened to sink the bill if it does not include a substantial increase in the state and local tax deduction, currently capped at $10,000. Senate Republicans, skeptical of the deduction, still ultimately decided to match the House plan to lift the cap to $40,000. But while the House made the increase permanent, the Senate keeps it for only five years, allowing it to snap back to $10,000 in 2030. The newest draft makes even sharper cuts to subsidies for wind and solar power, something that Trump and other conservatives had explicitly called for this past week. It remains to be seen whether those changes could cause friction with Republicans who have publicly supported green energy credits, including Tillis, Murkowski and Sen. John Curtis of Utah. Advertisement Previously, the Senate proposed allowing companies that were building wind and solar farms to claim a tax credit worth at least 30% of their costs if they started construction this year, with a phaseout over two years. But the revised bill would require companies place their projects 'in service' by the end of 2027 to claim the tax break. The bill would also impose additional taxes on renewable energy projects that receive 'material assistance' from China, even if they don't qualify for the credit. Because China dominates global supply chains, those new fees could affect a large number of projects. The new Senate measure would more quickly end tax credits for electric vehicles, doing away with them by Sept. 30. It would also slow the phaseout of a lucrative tax credit to make hydrogen fuels, allowing such projects to qualify if construction were started by the end of 2027, instead of by the end of this year. The bill also includes a provision written by Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, to sell as much as 1.225 million acres of federal land across the American West in order to build housing. Earlier versions of that proposal that would have auctioned off even more acreage had drawn fierce opposition from conservative hunters and outdoorsmen, and Republican senators from Montana and Idaho had said they would not vote for it. This article originally appeared in
Yahoo
11 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trump Demands Republicans Crack Down on Nonprofits That Protest ICE
President Donald Trump voiced support Saturday for new legislation aiming to punish groups linked to the June protests in Los Angeles against the administration's aggressive immigration raids and arrests. The legislation, offered by Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Calif.), would make nonprofits involved in supposedly 'organizing the riots' ineligible for federal funding or tax-exempt status. At the center of the proposed bill is an immigrants rights group based in L.A. that denies any wrongdoing and says the accusations are false. 'CONGRESSMAN KEVIN KILEY'S, 'NO TAX DOLLARS FOR RIOTS' legislation, should be passed immediately,' Trump posted on Truth Social on Saturday. 'I am hereby instructing my Administration not to pay ANY money to these radicalized groups, regardless of the legislation. They get paid to incite riots, burn down or destroy a city, then come back to the trough to get money to help rebuild it. NO MORE MONEY!!!' The text of the bill has not been publicly released. Kiley framed the protests against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as a threat. 'The violence we have witnessed in Los Angeles is a threat to the safety of our communities and federal officers, and it undermines democracy by obstructing the policies of a duly elected president from being implemented.' Kiley said in a statement. 'We need better tools to deter and punish this lawless and anti-democratic behavior.' The anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles began this month in response to the Trump administration's campaign of worksite immigration raids and courthouse arrests, which is reportedly being conducted at the demand of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller. Authorities have used flash-bang grenades, rubber bullets, and pepper balls on protesters, who have largely been non-violent. Trump used the protests as the basis for federalizing and deploying thousands of National Guard troops as well as hundreds of Marines. 'We have the IRS here that's helping us track how these violent protesters are funded,' Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said. 'What NGO is out there? What unions? What other individuals may be funding these violent perpetrators?' Kiley argues the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA) 'played a pivotal role in enabling the riots.' He alleges that the group broadcast federal officers' locations in real-time, and that several of the officers were assaulted with bricks and Molotov cocktails. Two people were charged with possession of Molotov cocktails, but there is no evidence they were tied to CHIRLA. 'They're saying the most vicious lies [about] who we are and what we do,' CHIRLA's Executive Director Angélica Salas told CBS News. 'My bill,' Kiley said Thursday on the House floor, 'will assure that an organization like this whose officers are convicted of assaulting, resisting, or impeding federal officers, or of organizing, promoting, and encouraging participating in or carrying on a riot… loses their nonprofit status and is ineligible for federal funding going forward,' Earlier this month, Sen. Josh Hawley, (R-Mo.), who is chair of the Senate Subcommittee on Crime and Counterterrorism, launched an investigation into CHIRLA's 'alleged role in financing and materially supporting the coordinated protests and riots' in Los Angeles. 'While peaceful protest is a cornerstone of American democracy, these demonstrations have escalated into lawless mob actions,' he wrote in a letter to the organization demanding more information. He noted that CHIRLA reportedly 'received $34 million in state funding.' Their 2023 tax return shows they received this amount in government grants. The organization previously had a $450,000 contract with the Department of Homeland Security for 'citizenship education and training.' DHS said it terminated this contract and intended to withhold $101,000 in funds that had not yet been paid to the group. 'Credible reporting now suggests that your organization has provided logistical support and financial resources to individuals engaged in these disruptive actions,' Hawley said. 'Let me be clear: Bankrolling civil unrest is not protected speech. It is aiding and abetting criminal conduct.' Salas, who leads CHIRLA, was a speaker at a press conference on June 6, when the first protests against ICE began, but that seems to be the extent of the group's involvement. 'Our community is under attack and is being terrorized,' she told the crowd. 'These are workers, these are fathers, these are mothers, and this has to stop. Immigration enforcement that is terrorizing our families throughout this country and picking up our people that we love must stop now.' She remains steadfast. 'We categorically reject any allegation that our work as an organization now and during the past 39 years providing services to immigrants and their families violates the law,' Salas said in a statement. 'Our mission is rooted in non-violent advocacy, community safety, and democratic values. We will not be intimidated for standing with immigrant communities and documenting the inhumane manner that our community is being targeted with the assault by the raids, the unconstitutional and illegal arrests, detentions, and the assault on our First Amendment rights.' More from Rolling Stone Trump Admin Says ICE Agents are the Real Victims Amid Violent Immigration Raids Trump's Military Birthday Parade 'Illegally' Used Hit Song: Cease-and-Desist Letter Florida GOP Hawks Merch for Brutal 'Alligator Alcatraz' Migrant Detention Camp Best of Rolling Stone The Useful Idiots New Guide to the Most Stoned Moments of the 2020 Presidential Campaign Anatomy of a Fake News Scandal The Radical Crusade of Mike Pence
