Immigrants under temporary programs in the US at greater risk of deportation under Trump?

The massive deportations of undocumented immigrants promised throughout the electoral campaign of the president-elect Donald Trump They have little possibility of being executed due to their high cost for the US economy; however, according to experts consulted, there are groups of migrants that would be affected by the Republican’s immigration policy.

The “unprecedented order” announced by Trump could occur first in groups that are already registered in the immigration system, agreed lawyers consulted by the Voice of America.

Immigration attorney Wilfredo Allen told the VOA that the first lines of the new immigration policy “based on the fact that what was said in the campaign by the president-elect and his vice president are true,” would first aim to suppress the executive orders applied by President Joe Biden, and even those signed by the former president Barack Obama and why they were overlooked in Trump’s first term.

He clarified that a mass deportation is “physically impossible and unaffordable,” but it can “make life impossible for those who are here without documents or waiting for documents.”

Hence, upon arriving at the White House on January 20, President Trump “can eliminate the humanitarian parole that has allowed the entry of a little more than 600,000 people from Nicaragua, Cuba, Haiti and Venezuela since its establishment. He has promised that he will deport the people who entered with that parole,” explained Allen from Miami, Florida.

In 2022, President Biden’s administration created humanitarian parole as a legal immigration route for immigrants from those four countrieswho arrived in record numbers at the southern border in the face of political and social crises in their nations of origin.

However, the Democratic administration announced in October that it would not extend the stay permit of parole beneficiaries when the two years of legal stay contemplated in the program had passed, leaving thousands of immigrants They would have to look for other methods to stay in the US or face deportation.

Weeks ago, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) announced that “has resumed processing of Advance Travel Authorizations” for certain citizens of those four countries under the program, after an “internal review implementing safeguards.”

Attorney Allen said that of this group of immigrants, those who are at risk are Venezuelans, Nicaraguans and Haitians, because Cubans have the benefit of the Adjustment Law which allows them to become legal after one year and one day of legal stay in the country.

TPS and DACA to another round of fights

The Resource Center for Central Americans (CARECEN) also agrees that the immigrant groups at greatest risk are those who are registered in the immigration system, who can be identified after a deportation order, much easier than those who have entered irregularly without being registered.

Santos Amaya, an immigration paralegal at CARECEN who has worked with immigrants since the 1980s, told VOAwhich although there are still no official announcements, but it is foreseeable that “in the technical part a little of what can be predicted”, is a reduction in requests due to the fear of entering the system because “hope is lost a little” , he comments.

Amaya referred to the risk for the more than 300,000 beneficiaries of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) “which is a quite delicate issue, or the DACA (Deferred Action Program for Childhood Arrivals) who have been here for many years” , whose permits were canceled by the first Trump administration in 2017.

Those actions gave way to a long process in federal courts until reaching the US Supreme Court, but when the Biden administration came in it terminated them, before a final verdict and reactivated the programs.

CARECEN Legal Services Director Genevieve Augustin added that she believes that given the court battles during the first Trump administrationa similar scenario would be probable, but it could happen more quickly.

Although proceedings could always be initiated in federal courts “but almost everything has already been said” during the first cases that established certain jurisprudence and since that precedent exists, decisions “could be faster,” he believes.

The current validity of TPS for El Salvador, Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua and Sudan, according to USCIS, it expires on March 9, 2025. A new reassignment or cancellation would be in the hands of the Secretary of Homeland Security who takes office in the incoming administration.

Thus time will also pass for the Venezuela TPSwhich in September 2023 was extended another 18 months by the Biden administration that “due to the growing instability and lack of security in Venezuela”, the temporary status was maintained.

In other groups of immigrants waiting to resolve their asylum requests, where there are millions of requests accumulatedexperts say they could try to create new courts to speed up those processes or bring more cases to trial, which would also mean more evidence banks for applicants to defend their cases.

Those waiting for appointments to adjust permanent residence status could rest easy, because the administrative process actually runs through the system, Attorney Allen noted.

The legal offices say they are prepared for the new stage that lies ahead with the decisions they hope will come from the Oval Office, after President Trump takes office for the second time in January.

And organizations like United We Dream, the largest network of young immigrants in the entire United States, also say they are ready to “protect” families.

Michelle Ming, political director of the organization told VOA that “Once Trump takes office, we will remind him that we are here to fight any kind of policies he tries to implement to harm our communities.”

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