Campaign Action
Senior U.S. diplomats warned former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson against terminating Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from El Salvador, Haiti and Honduras, but in what Senate Foreign Relations Committee member Robert Menendez (D-NJ) called “deliberate disregard” of that advice, Tiller joined in pressuring the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to kill TPS anyway, suddenly making 300,000 immigrants who had permission to live and work here deportable. This is white supremacy in action:
The warnings were transmitted to top State Department officials last year in embassy cables now at the center of an investigation by Senate Democrats, whose findings were recently referred to the Government Accountability Office. The Washington Post obtained a copy of their report.
The cables’ contents, which have not been previously disclosed, reveal career diplomats’ strong opposition to terminating the immigrants’ provisional residency, known as temporary protected status (TPS), and the possible deportation of hundreds of thousands of people to some of the poorest and most violent places in the Americas.
Menendez told the Washington Post “investigators also have evidence the White House’s domestic policy office ‘sought to repeatedly influence’ the TPS process and ensure a predetermined outcome.” It shouldn’t be any surprise who was working alongside Tillerson to deport 300,000 to the dangerous conditions they fled from in the first place—the White House’s leading white supremacist not named Donald Trump:
According to current and former State Department officials, the embassy cables were received by Tillerson’s aides but generated no reply from the secretary or his staff. In the ensuing weeks, Trump senior adviser and immigration hard-liner Stephen Miller placed phone calls to DHS Chief of Staff Chad Wolf and top Tillerson advisers telling them to end TPS anyway, according to current and former administration officials who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to offer their candid assessment of sensitive internal discussions.
Tillerson’s actions—remember, this man, much like the president who first nominated him to the post, had no experience relevant to the job he was confirmed to—left his department disillusioned and resulted in several resignations:
According to seven current and former administration officials, Tillerson’s handling of the TPS decision deepened morale problems at the State Department, directly contributing to several high-level resignations. One senior State Department official called it “heartbreaking” and a low point in the official’s career.
Career officials knew what immigrant rights advocates know and have been saying. Uprooting immigrants and parents with U.S. citizen kids and deep ties to the U.S. to nations like Honduras is not just senseless and cruel, it could be deadly. TPS recipient Samuel in Teen Vogue:
Five years ago, I used my savings to start my own construction company in Long Island, New York. Recently, the bank approved a $300,000 mortgage based on my good credit. I was so excited for the possibility of being able to buy a house for me and my family — but now, I can’t accept the mortgage because I’m in limbo, having been given a deadline of January 2020 to leave the U.S. and go back to Honduras.
I cannot begin to fathom returning to Honduras. The country has not fully recovered from Hurricane Mitch, and it’s become one of the most violent and unstable countries in the region. My children do not know Honduras, and after living 20 years outside of the place where I was born, neither do I. I do not know what awaits me if I return, but I know that there’s no job or home there.
According to Sen. Menendez, Senate Democrats want clarity on whether Tillerson’s replacement, Mike Pompeo, can reverse the administration’s action. “It would be woefully irresponsible for Congress to turn a blind eye to these discoveries,” he said:
“I am concerned that the Department of State, under then-Secretary of State Tillerson’s leadership, acted in a way that jeopardized U.S. national security and put at risk the physical safety of current beneficiaries of the Temporary Protected Status program,” Menendez wrote to Gene Dodaro, the comptroller general.
Representatives for Tillerson, whom Trump fired in March, did not respond to interview requests. A representative from the State Department said the agency would not comment on “internal or interagency deliberations.”
“As the facts about Trump’s TPS terminations come out,” tweeted the American Civil Liberties Union’s (ACLU) Omar Jadwat, “they strengthen the cases challenging these unconscionable actions—and put the lie to the administration’s claim that it played it straight and legit.”
