Stripped of their jobs and facing a U.S. government deportation campaign that has yet to come, Haitian immigrants in South Florida who lost their Temporary Protected Status last week now find themselves in a zone of economic uncertainty: They have no paychecks, no prospects for work and limited financial resources to sustain their households.
In South Florida and across the nation, advocates and economists say, many “de-documented” immigrants are taking refuge in a growing underground economy, where transactions are in cash and remain off the books. Those who dare are going mobile to quietly deliver services that once yielded paychecks. Others rely on friends and family to go the supermarket, fearing they’ll be arrested by agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“Some of them are scared the government will deport them to Haiti when they know they cannot survive in Haiti,” said Margarette Nerette, a vice president at Local 1199 of the Service Employees International Union, which represents healthcare workers. “They have kids who go to school. They don’t have work. It is illegal for them to be here right now. They cannot go to the doctor. They cannot go to the supermarket. They don’t have money right now. They don’t know what to do to survive the crisis the government has put them in.”
Last week, an incalculable number of Haitian immigrants who worked in agriculture, construction, healthcare, hospitality and transportation among other industries received dreaded termination notices from employers after a federal judge in Washington, D.C., following a mandate from the U.S. Supreme Court, lifted a stay of a Trump administration directive that canceled Temporary Protection Status for Haitians nationwide.
“At the FLL airport, we’ve lost approximately 50 employees, mostly airport janitors — many of whom have been there for years —wheelchair agents and cabin cleaners,” said Ana Tinsly, spokesperson for 32BJ of the SEIU, a national labor union.
UNITE HERE, which represents concessions and retail workers at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, had “significant losses as well.”
Normally, job losses result in workers filing for state-funded unemployment benefits — essentially stopgap financial aid that helps a person pay bills while he or she looks for work elsewhere. But for Haitians and other foreign nationals who have lost their protection status, work authorizations also disappear. In Florida, obtaining jobless or “re-employment” benefits is contingent on a worker’s documented efforts to find a new job. Denied a work authorization, newly laid off immigrants have no avenues to seek new employment.
Small business operators, while they keep their doors open, are looking over their shoulders for the police.
“With other ethnic groups, when they lost their TPS, they had to go underground and close their commercial locations and start being mobile out of their car or out of their house,” said Hector Diaz, a 35-year immigration lawyer who is managing partner of Your Immigration Attorney in Miami.
Since they can’t afford to pay their rent anymore, they become targets.
“It’s a mess we are creating. It’s like shooting yourself in the foot,” Diaz said.
The SEIU, whose members were under threat of being fired for the better part of a year and ultimately were terminated late last month, has been referring them to legal clinics and food banks run by other agencies. Some members have access to a union legal fund for low-cost legal help.
“People still have to put food on the table and if they are still here they are going to try to work,” said KPMG chief economist Diane Swonk, who has been tracking the economic effects of the Trump administration’s immigration policies. “And employers will be penalized if you pay over the table.”
The Government’s preference: “Get out”
From the U.S. government’s standpoint, there is only one option for the Haitian workers, many who have lived in South Florida for years: go home.
Less than a week ago, the Department of Homeland Security declared that it’s now time for Haitians formerly under TPS to leave.
“Temporary Protected Status is exactly that — temporary. For too long, TPS has been allowed to function as a de facto amnesty program despite Congress never intending it to be permanent,” DHS said in a statement to The Washington Post. “What we would say now is it’s closing time which means you don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.”
An online offer from the DHS includes the following exit procedure for “eligible undocumented individuals”:
- A $2,600 exit bonus upon their return;
- A free one-way plane ticket. The Department of Homeland Security “handles the booking and logistics for the return flight home”
- “De-prioritization”: Once vetted and registered, participants are deprioritized by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for arrest or enforcement while awaiting a departure date.
- Case dismissal: For individuals in active immigration proceedings, DHS will file a motion with the immigration court to dismiss the case.
- Future re-entry: Leaving voluntarily may improve the chances of returning legally to the U.S. in the future.
Participants must use a Customs and Border Protection app to submit their intent to depart.
The government pushed forward with its exit policy despite pleas to hold off from industry associations who said their members need the Haitian workers to help sustain operations.
The Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association, in league with multiple groups from other states, asked for more time to assess the impact of losing workers and adjust to a potential labor shortage. Nationwide, Haitians under TPS number close to 350,000, the FRLA noted in a June 30 letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Markwayne Mullin. “Florida alone has 93,000 TPS holders in the workforce who contribute $2.6 billion annually to the state economy,” the FRLA said.
The Florida Healthcare Association urged an exemption for long-term care facilities in the state, where large numbers of Haitian workers maintain close relationships with clients under their care.
Neither association responded to requests for comment after the Trump administration won its day in the courts.
Another significant TPS designation is set to expire on Oct. 2 under a federal court order after being activated in 2023, according to the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. The designation, for Venezuelans in the U.S., involves up to 600,000 people. Of the number, 400,000 are working, Swonk said.
“Taking workers out of critical sectors like construction, hospitality, and healthcare will drive up prices for housing, travel, dining, home care and much more at a time when Floridians are demanding lower costs,” said U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who has been advocating for the retention of Haitian, Venezuelan and other immigrant workers in the U.S. “ICE and CBP are wasting $260 billion on detaining and deporting law-abiding TPS holders who contribute billions in taxes each year towards Social Security, Medicare, and public schools.”
Nerette of the SEIU said the terminated Haitian workers are uncertain about what to do next.
“My hands are tied,” she said. “I have so many people calling me asking me what I think they should do, and I don’t have an answer.”
Nerette said she knows of some people who have applied for asylum in the U.S. and others who are exploring Canada as an option.
“I know there are some people looking to see if they can go to Canada or somewhere else,” she said. “For you to go to Canada is expensive.”
Diaz, the Miami immigration lawyer, agreed the legal options for Haitians are narrow, with asylum the chief way regain a footing in the U.S. But it takes a long time. An immigrant is generally eligible to apply for a work permit 150 days after an asylum application is completed and received by USCIS or an immigration court. Then, it takes another three months for the permit to arrive.
Another way to stay is to file a family petition which allows a U.S. citizen or permanent resident to sponsor a relative who wants to obtain a green card. A so-called adjustment of status application can be filed while the petition is pending.
But the process is not seamless, and the sudden loss of authorizations often leaves the once lawful immigrant in limbo.
Limited pathways
Michael A. Clemens, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics who researches the economic impacts of immigration and TPS, said he is disheartened by the dearth of conversation among elected officials and policymakers to find pathways to residency and citizenship.
Clemens acknowledged that TPS was not deigned “as a permanent status for people to work in the United States ad infinitum.”
“If you you have no other proposal at all for people who are established here who are actively contributing to the economy and no interest in establishing any kind of lawful pathway … that’s a big problem,” he said.
This article has been updated to correct references to Hector Diaz, a 35-year immigration lawyer who is managing partner of Your Immigration Attorney in Miami.
