‘As harsh as it gets’
Haitian fury as Prez pulls welcome mat
HAITIAN NEW YORKERS reacted with fury Tuesday over the Trump administration’s decision to end a temporary residency program for almost 60,000 of their compatriots.
The Homeland Security Department said it was spiking the program — put in place after Haiti’s devastating 2010 earthquake — because conditions have improved on the Caribbean island.
“This is inhuman. This is as harsh as it gets,” said Ricot Dupoy, 64, who owns the Brooklyn-based Radio Soleil Haitian radio program.
The decision to end “temporary protected status” for 59,000 Haitians gives them 18 months to leave the country or face deportation.
The announcement sparked protests in the city and across the country — and drew strong denunciations from Mayor de Blasio and other New York politicians.
“Rescinding temporary protected status on the eve of Thanksgiving is an attack on working families,” de Blasio tweeted. “5,400 Haitians with TPS have lived in New York City legally for years, making our city better. We must let them stay. #SaveTPS”
Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D-N.Y.) slammed the decision as coldhearted and cruel.
She called on lawmakers to support a bill that would offer a path to citizenship for those granted temporary protected status.
“Once again, the Trump administration is showing that it ascribes to a small-minded and coldhearted vision of America,” Velazquez said.
“Cruelly sending tens of thousands of Haitians back to a country that does not have the capacity to absorb them would be immoral and a stain on our nation’s conscience.”
Scores of Haitians and their supporters demonstrated outside Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home in Florida to express their disapproval.
Roughly 320,000 people from nine countries ravaged by war or natural disasters live in the U.S. under the temporary protected status program, which was signed into law by President George H. W. Bush in 1990.
Haitian immigrants who fled to the U.S. following the 7.0-magnitude earthquake in 2010 were overjoyed when the Obama administration granted them the 18-month temporary refuge.
Obama renewed it every time it ran out. The Trump administration has taken a tougher stance on beneficiaries of the program, ending protections for Nicaraguans last month.
The Monday announcement — which also applies to children — was made 60 days before the Haitians’ temporary status was set to expire.
Homeland Security officials in May extended the program for six months, rather than the usual 18.
Advocates for the Haitian earthquake survivors say conditions on the island remain poor in the wake of several hurricanes.
Joe Dessources, 67, a Haitian who lives in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, and is now a citizen, agreed.
“Haiti is still in bad shape,” Dessources said. “People have no electricity, no running water, and the medical system is out of business.”
Marc Jean, a 53-year-old Haitian living in Flatbush, Brooklyn, said his 13-year-old nephew who moved to the U.S. five years ago is now wracked with fear.
“He’s worrying now that he’ll get deported, and that makes me sad,” Jean said.
“I wish I could do something to help him out. Life is very hard in Haiti. There is no life down there for young kids.”