WASHINGTON — Jose Cabrera took time off from his job as a landscaper to join three Latino Democratic senators at a news conference Wednesday in which he called on the Biden administration to renew protected statuses like his before President-elect Donald Trump enters the White House returns.
Cabrera, of Montgomery County, Maryland, has lived in the United States for more than 30 years and is protected from deportation and granted a work permit. His home country of El Salvador is considered too risky to return to, giving him the label “ Temporary protection statusor TPS.
He and other immigrants living legally in the United States fear they will be swept away if they lose their protected status as Trump implements his campaign promise of mass deportations.
Senators Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Alex Padilla of California and Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico are urging the Biden administration to redesignate TPS for nationals from Nicaragua and El Salvador and also designate TPS for people from Ecuador.
El Salvador’s TPS ends in March and Nicaragua’s TPS ends in July, after Trump takes office on January 20.
“We know that the new administration will seek to implement chaotic immigration policies that will tear our families apart,” Cortez Masto said.
Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus also stressed that the White House should direct the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s immigration agency to expedite renewal applications for people in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
“It’s time for this administration to ensure we can renew their DACA status now, before they are threatened by the Trump administration,” Cortez Masto said.
The White House could not immediately be reached for comment.
There is a threat of mass deportations
The senators stressed that the Biden administration should take action given Trump’s promise to carry out mass deportations targeting the millions of immigrants without legal status. Those with TPS could easily be deported if their status is not renewed.
TPS designations can last for six, 12, or 18 months before being renewed and cover more than 1 million immigrants. The status does not provide a path to citizenship.
So far 17 countries have done this TPS designation and it was used, for example, in the escape of Ukrainians from the Russian war in Ukraine.
Andrea Flores, vice president of immigration policy and campaigns at the immigration advocacy group FWD.us, said Biden should utilize TPS to protect those with that status from the incoming Trump administration.
During the first Trump administration, the former president tried to end TPS for Haiti, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Sudan but failed in the courts blocked these attempts in 2018.
“These people will now lose their legal status in the next government. These people are being deported en masse and sent back to a country where they are guaranteed to be persecuted,” Flores said.
Padilla and Luján emphasized that mass deportations would harm not only communities but also the U.S. economy. The US Senate Judiciary Committee held a consequences hearing on Tuesday of mass deportations, which Republicans have indicated will move quickly once Trump takes office.
“Mass deportations threaten the safety of millions of mixed-status families, sow deep (dis)trust and fear in the communities we represent, and undoubtedly destabilize the economy of the United States,” Luján said.
There are approximately 4 million mixed-status families, meaning family members with different immigration statuses.
Padilla said those who have TPS and DACA all work in indispensable U.S. industries.
“By revoking the work permits of hundreds of thousands of workers, we are disempowering our own workforce,” he said.
IF you do it
Trump, who tried to end DACA during his first term, said during a sit-down interview with NBC on Sunday that he would “work with Democrats on a plan” to keep those recipients in the U.S., but did not elaborate Details.
The program is currently awaiting a federal court decision decide his legal fate.
Thomas A. Saenz, president and general counsel of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which is defending DACA in court along with the state of New Jersey, said Dreamers should continue to apply for extensions “and not be afraid of an extension.”
“They should continue to seek an extension, perhaps even sooner than they otherwise might, to try to extend the period under which they are protected,” he said in an interview with States Newsroom.
Cortez Masto said she is always willing to work to protect Dreamers but is skeptical of Trump’s comments.
“The last time he said that and we presented him with a bipartisan bill to do something to protect our Dreamers, he killed it,” she said.
Cortez Masto was referring to a 2018 bipartisan deal struck by Sens. Mike Rounds, Republican of South Dakota, and Angus King, independent of Maine, that would have provided DACA recipients with a path to citizenship and funding for a border wall .
“The government has all our information”
Juliana Macedo do Nascimento, deputy director of federal advocacy at the immigrant advocacy group United We Dream, said in an interview with States Newsroom that she was concerned that Immigration and Customs Enforcement, through the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, had access to information about DACA applicants receive legal immigration paperwork processed.
“We’re really concerned that we’re just giving ICE a list of people that they can then go to (and knock on their doors),” she said.
Macedo do Nascimento, herself a DACA recipient, said her organization is calling on the Biden administration to create a firewall between USCIS databases and DHS agencies such as ICE and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
“The government has all of our information,” she said. “They could come for us at any time. That’s the worst-case scenario.”
Last updated on December 11, 2024 at 2:25 p.m
