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As the Trump administration continues waging war on undocumented immigrants, it’s also slowly chipping away at protections for immigrants who have permission to be here, after failing to redesignate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Yemen.
Instead, the administration has opted to extend protections to around 1,300 Yemenis for another 18 months, through March 3, 2020. The distinction is important, tweeted Abed Ayoub of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, “because all those who arrived after the last registration period,” as many as 400, “will not be permitted to apply for TPS, and may be forced to go back to Yemen.”
According to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), “ongoing armed conflict and extraordinary and temporary conditions ... support Yemen’s current designation for TPS continue to exist.” But at risk will be others who fled Yemen—included in the Muslim ban and “a country besieged by ongoing armed conflict, described as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis by the UN Secretary General,” according to Muslim Advocates—and cannot apply for protections.
“The decision comes,” America’s Voice notes, “after the administration terminated TPS for six countries that could lead to 300,000 people forcibly deported and separated from their 273,000 US citizen children.” In the case of Haiti, officials knew conditions remained dire following devastating natural disasters and a cholera outbreak, and terminated TPS anyway.
When it comes to the “shit hole” administration, giving a little over 1,000 people a little more time in the U.S. shouldn’t be considered generous when it’s already made 300,000 others vulnerable to deportation soon. At risk are families with homes, jobs, deep roots in the U.S., and hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizen children who must not be torn from their country.
“Before having TPS,” said Hani Moshen, a Yemeni TPS holder living in New York, “I was a student and I was supported by my family. But as a result of the war, all of my father’s businesses in Yemen were shut down. TPS has changed my life because I am able to support myself and make a living. Now, my family does not have to support me. Because of the administration’s decision to not redesignate TPS for Yemen,” she continued, “many will be forced to survive in war conditions. The situation is so bad … living in Yemen at this time is a death sentence.”