President Trump has cancelled the temporary protected status designation for half a million Haitian migrants, representing a rollback of a Biden era Department of Homeland Security that was used to game and “exploit” the asylum system in order to protect illegal aliens from deportations, the administration has said.
DHS Secretary Kris Noem announced that she has vacated a decision by the Biden administration to extend Temporary Protected Status for Haitian nationals after the Biden Administration granted it for 18 months this past June. “President Trump and I are returning TPS to its original status: temporary,” Noem said in a statement.
With the latest development, tens-of-thousands of Haitian nationals will lose their TPS status by August as opposed to February of next year.
TPS grants recipients with protection from deportation and allows them to receive work permits in the U.S. if they come from a country deemed unsafe to return to. Republicans have long been skeptical of the program, which was applied to nationals from 17 countries by the Biden Administration.
In a press release, DHS said TPS has been “exploited and abused” and noted that Haiti had been designated for TPS since 2010. More than 520,000 Haitians were estimated to be eligible for TPS protection in July, according to a report from Fox News.
“Biden and Mayorkas attempted to tie the hands of the Trump administration by extending Haiti’s Temporary Protected Status by 18 months—far longer than justified or necessary,” a DHS spokesperson said in a statement. “We are returning integrity to the TPS system, which has been abused and exploited by illegal aliens for decades. President Trump and Secretary Noem are returning TPS to its original status: temporary.”
TPS status became a hot-button topic during the 2024 presidential campaign cycle, as the plight of residents in Springfield, Ohio made national headlines. The once quiet Ohio town has become a symbol of the illegal immigration crisis in America after the Biden-Harris Administration dumped more than 20,000 Haitian migrants in the town of 40,000. Residents have complained about pets and wild animals being eaten by the migrants, while car accidents have surged and enrollment in benefits from noncitizens has overrun local hospitals and schools.
Springfield, Ohio:
Multiple homeless locals speak on how the Haitian influx is negatively affecting them:
“They taking the jobs, they taking the houses, and they get money.”
“We’re American citizens we was born here and we can’t get half the benefits they get.”
“They… pic.twitter.com/HW3srwcr6A— Tayler Hansen (@TaylerUSA) September 13, 2024
“We’ve got an influx of folks that have come in, and I think we were a little bit shocked that it was close to 20,000 people in a community of 60,000, and that’s caused some issues between the folks that live here and the folks that are coming in,” former Republican state Rep. Kyle Koehler said back in July.
In addition to the reports of missing pets and killings of wild animals — which have been dismissed by mainstream media outlets and most political leaders — residents have been particularly concerned about rapidly declining road safety. Residents have noted that Haitian migrants with little to no driving experience are given driver’s licenses in the U.S.
“We do have a really abnormal number of car accidents that are happening,” Koehler said. “And it’s not only the number but the severity of them. When you go on a street that is a 35-mile-an-hour speed limit, and there’s a car sitting on its hood, and I’m not talking about one, I’m talking about five or six accidents a week like that, you begin to wonder.”
In one of the most serious incidents, a bus carrying dozens of local schoolchildren collided with a van, killing 11-year-old Aiden Clark and injuring several others. The bus was being driven by Hermanio Joseph, a Haitian migrant who did not have a valid driver’s license.
killing 11-year-old Aiden Clark and injuring several others. The bus was being driven by Hermanio Joseph, a Haitian migrant who did not have a valid driver’s license.
The latest TPS move comes after Noem revoked a TPS extension for Venezuelan migrants, and then an additional 300,000 foreign nationals.
The Trump Administration has essentially ended the Biden Administration’s “catch and release” policy, which facilitated the entry and subsequent dispersement into the interior United States of millions of illegal aliens. Asylum seekers were given court dates before being provided with transport to a city of their choosing. Immigration officials and policy experts have long warned that millions of asylum seekers never show up for their court dates and become essentially untraceable in the United States.
Republicans have also been highly critical of the liberal, and outright illegal use of the asylum system under the previous administration .International asylum law requires applicants to apply in the first safe country they enter, though this is not the case on the southern border, as “asylum seekers” had been showing up from all over the world.
