Florida Republican says deporting Haitians with TPS would be ‘huge mistake’

Carlos Giménez, a Republican congressman from Florida, broke with the Trump administration on Sunday, calling on the White House to reconsider its push to eliminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian migrants.Returning some 350,000 Haitians to their chaotic, dangerous homeland following the US supreme court’s ruling that the Trump administration can cut off temporary legal protections, would be a grave error, Giménez said.“Haiti is a failed state, and I think that deporting Haitians that are under TPS right now, back to Haiti, would be a huge mistake,” he told CBS News. Giménez also called for the re-instatement of TPS status to Venezuelans after the record-breaking twin earthquakes that struck north-central Venezuela on 24 June.Temporary Protected Status, Giménez said, “is meant to safeguard those who are either fleeing countries that are failed states and are at risk of going back to them or countries that really can’t handle them right now, as is the case with Venezuela that has suffered a natural disaster”.Carlos Giménez, as mayor of Miami-Dade, Florida, during a rally with Venezuelans living in Miami, Florida, on 1 February 2020. Photograph: Eva Marie Uzcategui/ReutersGiménez, whose family fled Cuba when he was seven, represents part of Miami-Dade county, home to some 110,000 residents of Haitian ancestry.The supreme court ruling authorized the administration’s plans to end TPS for over 350,000 Haitians and approximately 6,000 Syrians. A guidance issued last week by the Department of Homeland Security said TPS Haiti beneficiaries will keep their status and employment authorization “until the lower courts align with the US Supreme Court’s favorable decision”.Carlos Giménez addresses Cuban Americans demonstrators outside the White House in Washington DC on 26 July 2021. Photograph: Will Oliver/EPAGiménez’s comments align with those of Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, whose state is home to a thriving Haitian community in the town of Springfield that Donald Trump and JD Vance spread false claims about during their 2024 election campaign to justify their anti-immigration agenda.DeWine called on the Trump administration last week to reconsider pushing for the elimination of Temporary Protected Status for Haitian migrants. “Look at how it’s going to impact states like Ohio. In Ohio, the Haitians are working primarily in manufacturing, they’re also working in the food area.”“It’s Haitians who, many times, are taking care of your mom or your dad who has Alzheimer’s, taking care of family members who might be in a nursing home,” the governor told CNN. “And to say we’re going to pull all those people out, it’s just not in our own self-interest.”DeWine also said Haiti is “clearly” not safe, pointing to the state department travel advisories, and argued that ending TPS for Haitian migrants “is not in the United States’s interest, certainly not in Ohio’s interest, to have people who are working every single day, who are supporting a family, who are buying houses, fixing up old houses, starting businesses, and then put deep roots in this country, and really are contributing –– and yank them out.”“I would hope the Trump administration would reconsider,” DeWine added.Also opposing an end to TPS for Haitian migrants is New York Republican Mike Lawler, a congressman who represents a swing district and is at risk of losing his seat in the midterm elections. Lawler has said one-third of the Haitian TPS holders work in healthcare. “Immediately shutting off TPS” would “create a crisis” in hospitals, nursing homes and within disabilities community, he said.Giménez has previously called on the Trump administration to back away from the ending TPS for Haitian migrants and backed a bill requiring the secretary of homeland security to designate Haiti for TPS until 2029. “Haiti today is overrun by violent gangs,” said in a statement in April. “It is neither safe nor humane to force our neighbors back into those conditions.” Providing TPS, he added, “is not just sound policy – it’s the right thing to do and I’m proud to vote for this commonsense, bipartisan solution that ensures our Haitian neighbors can continue contributing to our community”.The bill, HR 1689, passed the House 224–204 after receiving support from South Florida lawmakers, including María Elvira Salazar, Mario Díaz-Balart and Giménez – all Republicans from Miami – along with Democrats in the state. The bill currently awaits consideration in the Senate.