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Immigration TPS Haitians living the United States
Immigrant activists contend that although the informal reprieve from deportation offers some relief to illegal immigrants from Haiti, without the right to work that TPS provides, they are still extremely limited. Allowing such immigrants full access to American jobs could also vastly increase the amount that Haitians are able to send relatives back home at a time when Haiti is in desperate need of cash, said Steve Forester, a Miami-based advocate with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti.
"When somebody works here they can support up to 10 times that number back in Haiti. So we're talking about supporting hundreds of thousands of people in Haiti at no cost to U.S. taxpayers," Forester said.
As it is, Haitians living the United States send back about $1.2 billion annually -- accounting for 20 percent of Haiti's GDP, according to Manuel Orozco, an expert with the Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue. It is unclear how much higher the figure would be if those here illegally were granted TPS. They number between 75,000 to 125,000, accounting for as many as one in four Haitian immigrants, according to Jeffrey S. Passel, a demographer with the Pew Hispanic Center.
Most have stayed under the official radar, but about 31,000 have outstanding orders of removal. About 160 are in detention, said Kelly Nantel, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The rest include many asylum applicants who were turned down and ordered removed, but not necessarily given a date to report for deportation, according to Nantel.
Several advocates for stricter immigration controls expressed reservations about extending TPS to Haitians, noting that the status has been continually renewed for other groups long after the disaster that triggered it. For instance, tens of thousands of Salvadorans have been able to remain under the TPS granted to them in the wake of a 2001 earthquake, even as other Salvadorans who illegally entered the United States in the years since are routinely deported.
"TPS was invented for the kind of situation in Haiti, so it's totally justified in this case. But this is also an opportunity to re-assess the way TPS is done," said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies. "The law should be much more clear that this isn't a way to get your foot in the door and get a green card. Temporary has to mean temporary."
Abogados January 15, 2010 07:46 AM | Preguntas Para Abogados
