But since returning to office last year, the Trump administration has almost categorically terminated existing TPS designations for some of the most dangerous countries in the world – a policy change that eventually led the highest court to authorize ending the program for Haiti and Syria, despite both countries being on the state department’s “do not travel” advisory list.
“In a stunning contradiction, the administration advises Americans against all travel to Haiti – and instructs those who go anyway to draft a will and submit DNA samples so their remains can be identified,” said Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of the immigrant-serving non-profit Global Refuge.
He continued: “That is the government’s own assessment of the danger. To then compel hundreds of thousands of Haitians into such dire circumstances is an unconscionable abdication of our moral responsibility.”
More than 300,000 Haitians have lost TPS permission overnight and could endure deportation if they have not applied for another form of immigration relief, such as asylum in the US or a green card. For a wide swathe of people, no such pathway to citizenship exists, even if they have lived in the US for decades.
