Barring Pathways to Safety: IINE Statement on Supreme Court’s Decisions on TPS for Haiti and Syria and Asylum Seekers
Today’s Supreme Court’s decisions to allow the presidential administration to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for hundreds of thousands of Haitians and Syrians in the U.S. and block asylum seekers at the border are cruel and inhumane.
These decisions give the administration unfettered power to bar people seeking safety in the U.S. through legal pathways, and to remove the over 1.3 million TPS holders already here under U.S. protection and strip them of their work authorization. As a result, families will be torn apart; individuals will be forced to return to the unsafe country conditions the U.S. has warned its citizens of; employers will lose hardworking individuals; and the U.S. will be violating a century of commitment to help protect others threatened by persecution and oppression.
In recent years, IINE has welcomed and proudly served thousands of people from Haiti and helped several hundred apply for TPS. This news is devastating, but we will not abandon our neighbors, coworkers, and friends who have put down roots and have made our communities stronger and more vibrant. There are approximately 200,000 Haitian TPS holders in the U.S. workforce. They are business owners, nursing assistants and caregivers taking care of our elderly, agricultural workers, and construction workers integral to our economy and prosperity.
With 1 in 70 people forcibly displaced across the globe, the United States should not be closing our doors and threatening newcomers who give so much to our nation. Instead, we should be creating more pathways for legal immigration and citizenship.
At IINE, we will continue to advocate for and pursue every available pathway to maximize our clients’ protections under the law. We urge Congress to act swiftly to provide emergency protections for those at risk of losing status and call on employers to assess work authorization individually rather than making broad assumptions.
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