The State Department told the Department of Homeland Security this week that a program protecting hundreds…
The State Department told the Department of Homeland Security this week that a program protecting hundreds of thousands of Central Americans and Somali refugees from deportation should be nixed, reports the Washington Post.
The Department of Homeland Security must announce Monday whether those protections will be renewed for 57,000 Hondurans and 2,500 Nicaraguans whose status will otherwise expire in January.
TPS was set up in 1990 to protect foreigners from being deported to countries hit by political instability or natural disasters. And some say that the move could hurt the US economy. In addition, one study has estimated that TPS holders have nearly 275,000 USA -born children in their families.
“With this particular law, it is very clear to this administration what needs to be done”, a Trump administration official told the Post, though they added that they understand how ending the designations would present “a very hard decision” for TPS recipients.
Immigration advocacy groups fear the Trump administration will curtail the program by refusing to renew the protected status of some of the nine countries covered: El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen.
The Trump administration has long said the program was supposed to be temporary but has taken a semi-permanent status.
And this week, following the truck terror attack in NY that killed eight people, the President urged Congress to end the Diversity Immigrant Visa program under which suspect Sayfullo Saipov entered the United States in 2010.
