Up to 200,000 Haitian Immigrants to Receive TPS
Jan 16th, 2010 | 9 responses
“TPS” stands for Temporary Protected Status, and it is routinely given to foreign nationals whose home countries are experiencing an extreme crisis of some kind, either a natural disaster or civil war or unrest.
Haitian activists in the United States have been trying to get the U.S. government to extend TPS to undocumented Haitian immigrants since 2008, when Haiti was ripped apart by four tropical cyclones one right after the other, which killed 800 people, with hundreds more unaccounted for, and devastated at least one Haitian city (Gonaives).
The Obama administration specified that the order was for immigrants already in the United States as of Tuesday, and does not include Haitian refugees trying to flee Haiti in the wake of the earthquake. Haitians who are currently living in the United States illegally — even those 30,000 or so who already have been scheduled for deportation — will now be allowed to stay here for 18 months. TPS can be extended beyond the 18 months depending on conditions in Haiti at that point.
Granting TPS is an important humanitarian move, not just for the immigrants themselves, but also for the three million (figure cited by MSNBC) Haitians who have been affected by the earthquake. For one thing, Haitians living and working in the United States send home an estimated $1.2 million a year. That’s about 20 percent of Haiti’s economy, according to the Washington Post.
Another obvious point is that deporting 200,000 Haitians back to Haiti at this moment would make the suffering there even worse than it already is. Haitian survivors desperately need the food, water, and medical supplies that are flooding into the country but not yet getting beyond the airport for various logistical reasons. Not to mention the fact that there is no place for 200,000 additional Haitians to live or stay, given that Port-au-Prince’s entire building stock has been flattened.
Unsurprisingly (and it’s extremely sad that it is unsurprising), some Republicans are complaining about today’s decision:
While several liberal groups and members of Congress had urged the administration to declare TPS for Haitians, conservative immigration groups, as well as a Republican congressman, had said such a move would amount to a slippery slope to “amnesty.”
“This sounds to me like open borders advocates exercising the Rahm Emanuel axiom: ‘Never let a crisis go to waste,’” Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said in an e-mail message to ABCNews. “Illegal immigrants from Haiti have no reason to fear deportation, but if they are deported, Haiti is in great need of relief workers, and many of them could be a big help to their fellow Haitians.”
I guess he must realize how cold-hearted this sounds, since he tried to clothe it in faux humanitarianism.
Even Fred Hiatt urged Pres. Obama to grant TPS, sheesh.
Jesse Walker at Reason magazine’s Hit and Run blog (libertarian, with conservative stances on most issues) even thinks that the Obama administration should extend the invitation.
9 Responses to “Up to 200,000 Haitian Immigrants to Receive TPS”
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……………as it should be!
Spirasol — no need to get too excited. The reason for doing this is that it's the sensible thing to do because of the logistics: There's really nowhere to send them right now back in Haiti, noplace that can be expected to be set up to receive them (which is their responsibility, not ours). There is no strong moral stance here, certainly no “obligation” [sic] to let them stay here, any more than we are “obliged” [sic] to help Haiti itself. In both cases, it's a gift. (And Haiti is in such poor shape right now, and in cases like this, do we really expect to be thanked, or require it, from the recipient? No.)
Kathy — you apparently misunderstand the politics related to this. Of course anything resembling any form of “amnesty” or pardoning of illegal immigrants, and any action in the direction of deliberate laxity or admission, is a political event and has political implications. It also reintroduces the threat long held by the Dems and openly desired by libs and Dems this past year, for amnesty in the name of immigration “reform.” (We all know, or should know, what really is being sought, and why; it's shameful that many libs and Dems will be evasive or dishonest about this, just because they know they'll face objection and resistance.) The libs and Dems aren't the only ones in favor of amnesty, and your emotional response that involves some conservative groups shows you appear to misunderstand. Of course the kinds of parties you name, which also include the Wall Street Journal, which already has leaped to praise the decision (this was freely available yesterday to read, in fact), will approve of this. (You can probably expect Cato, for example, to express support, if it is politically consistent.)
There is an obvious, glaring distinction that should be made between support for soundness's sake (plain common sense, logic, reason, logistics), and support for emotion's sake (unmerited — should be irrevelent), or for politics' sake (which is what is motivating so much of the support, even if the naive or others may fail to see what's blatant and predictable, in fact).
dear DLS, this extension will not protect people from Haiti who are charged with criminal acts, or found guilty of such. As I understand it, do you understand it this way too? it's an extension of visa, green cards, etc for, I think 18 mos, as in the moment, there's no country to go back to in essence. In the 'immigration prison' system, that means that those found guilty of whatever crime, I think, will be incarcerated longer here. It also means, as I understand it, that any soul from Haiti can return to Haiti at will (when passenger ships/ planes are allowed again). It is not a requirement that they stay here. KNowing some folks from both Dom. Rep and Haiti, and some go back and forth to both countries, they are touched that President thought of their kith and kin. This is my understanding so far while plugged into a network of priests and nuns in Haiti. More to come. Much more.
“this extension will not protect people from Haiti who are charged with criminal acts, or found guilty of such. As I understand it, do you understand it this way too? it's an extension of visa, green cards, etc for, I think 18 mos, as in the moment, there's no country to go back to in essence”
I believe criminals won't necessarily be protected — and I suspect there even are some lessons on the minds of people currently (who aren't always in the news because the clowns at the top of the hierarchy are the typical news-makers) from the Mariel boatlift.
Right now, there's nothing even to send the criminals back to in Haiti.
The extension, including its time period, makes sense. However, there are politics with immigration reform that are ever present (remember, immigration “reform” was deferred along with other issues seen as less important than health care “reform” — another example being changes to Don't Ask, Don't Tell for gays-in-the-military, and another being “card check” [Employee Free Choice Act]). The politics of the immigrants can't fail to be noticed (there no doubt are true far-right rumblings somewhere that all Haitians here will be given voting rights, and probably citizenship, too), especially as this is related to the Haitian disaster and (something few have apparently wanted to think about or view as the subject of interest it already has become, as I've noted, but which is there, even if only at the unconscious level with most) the need to face what will happen in the longer term for Haiti — not just rescuing the injured and stranded, but deciding
what we all (the rest of the world) will do to help Haiti recover and resume something like normal life (the 18-month period, the length of time, for delaying repatriation of Haitians currently here is a logical length given this next stage of things Haiti and other nations face), as well as the longer term questions about what Haiti and other nations may do to prevent future suffering and move Haiti along in development.
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Those are good points, and logical. Thanks DLS. I see what you see, but from a slightly different angle, the looonnnnnnnnnggg time re fulfilling useful 'promises.' I wonder alot DLS. I wonder if anyone can be president and fulfill such huge surging needs here, perhaps anywhere. I was just thinking as I drove over an old bridge today, this bridge wouldnt hold for a second if there was even a 5 on the richter. The state bridges alone ought be rebuilt… but then… other things have to come first. Which first is first, in reality, in our country has become more and more wobbly. Still waiting. But tend to think not wait for gov't almost ever. Just help whatever, whomever is within reach as one can. I'm aware gov does much, local, state, fed. MUCH. Individuals too. And yet, such need.
All: Don't neglect what's at the bottom of this posting. Scroll down to the string of asterisks…
” I was just thinking as I drove over an old bridge today, this bridge wouldnt hold for a second if there was even a 5 on the richter. The state bridges alone ought be rebuilt… but then… other things have to come first.”
Sadly, that was the message we were all sent, with what was actually done with the “stimulus” — rather than go to what I and others were saying at the time, do things like not only electrical transmission projects, or road projects, but repairing or replacing deficient bridges:
http://www.bts.gov/programs/geographic_informat…
Seismic retrofitting could probably be done in addition to energy-conservation measures like insulation, as well as replacing substandard housing and other structures, demolition and removal in Detroit, etc., examples that were discussed on this site but sadly weren't part of the stimulus.
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*********************************************************** (Here, all. — DLS)
Related to federal policy regarding the Haitians is news now about other details, which appear to reveal either decisions favoring political motives of some kind (which would explain it), or evidence (as with a number of other issues and decisions made this past year) that ObamaCo and possibly the Congre-Dems are once again in over their heads and scrambling. It's not so much that they're refusing to take in any homeless in Haiti, to the USA (warning them not to ttry to come to the United States), though I'd find the failure by the Usual Suspects to complain about this Cruelty to be hypocrites once again. (Moving deportees out of the processing center to make room for Haitians caught trying to come here makes perfect sense, on the other hand.) But even more importantly, how do you explain a refusal to transport Haitians temporarily here specifically and only for emergent and urgent medical treatment, while at the same time intending to admit some orphaned Haitians? (They can't seriously claim it's a decision made to control US health care costs or reduce strains on our system.)
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/19/us/19refugee….
The U.S. generously granted and extended TPS for 82,000 Hondurans and 5,000 Nicaraguans after Hurricane Mitch in 1998 and to 260,000 Salvadorans after an earthquake in 2001. There’s no reason why Haitians should be treated any different.
“There’s no reason why Haitians should be treated any different.”
You're right about that. The similar (or even identical, effectively) treatement of others after otther natural disasters should be more common news. It's an outstanding defense of this decision.
Of course, some will gripe about our doing this for anybody at all, but that's an overreaction now.
I felt the decision was essential, anyway, given there's nothing to send the Haitians back to nowadays.