Trump administration ends protections for over 50,000 Hondurans in the U.S.
More than 50,000 Hondurans who have been allowed to live and work in the United States since 1999 will have 20 months to leave the country or face deportation, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen announced Friday, the latest in a series of DHS measures aimed at tightening U.S. immigration controls.
The Hondurans were granted temporary protected status, or TPS, in 1999, shielding them from deportation after Hurricane Mitch slammed their country and left 10,000 dead across Central America.
Under President Donald Trump, DHS has been eliminating TPS programs one by one, arguing they were never designed to grant long-term residency to foreigners who may have arrived illegally or overstayed their visas.
Honduras remains one of the most violent countries in the world and has been roiled by political instability since presidential elections last year whose legitimacy was rejected by the Organization of American States and other international observers.
Congress established TPS as a humanitarian program in 1990 to avoid deporting foreigners to countries that have been destabilized by natural disasters or civil strife.
The Trump administration hasn’t ended the protections for every eligible nation; in January, Nielsen extended TPS for nearly 7,000 immigrants from war-torn Syria.
More than 86,000 Hondurans received TPS protections after the hurricane, and the latest government estimates show that about 50,000 still depend on the designation to remain in the United States. Last November, DHS ended TPS for 2,500 Nicaraguans who also were allowed to stay after Hurricane Mitch.
Hondurans were the second-largest group of TPS recipients after Salvadorans, and many have lived most of their adult lives in the United States, running businesses, purchasing homes and raising American-born children.