WASHINGTON (TNND) — Ohio GOP Gov. Mike DeWine said that it would be a mistake for President Donald Trump to increase the deportations of Haitian migrants.
DeWine’s comments come as over 300,000 migrants from Haiti are set to lose their Temporary Protected Status.
CBS News reported earlier this week that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) will ramp up deportations of Haitians starting this week.
“These are people who have helped Springfield really come back,” the governor said during an interview in Columbus, adding that them being deported would negatively impact the state.
“The Haitians who are living there and employed there, they came there to work, and they came there because there were jobs that were not being filled by other people,” DeWine said.
Viles Dorsainvil, the Director of the Haitian Support Center, said in a local interview that the migrants left Haiti for a reason.
“Maybe they might be able to apply for asylum, but when it comes to adjusting their status to have a green card or a citizenship, it’s not an easy path. The Haitian community is faced with a catch-22 situation,” he said.
DeWine said that Haiti is “hell” and that sending people back there would be a bad decision.
“Haiti is hell today,” he said. “So you’d be sending people back to hell. Very few of these Haitians will voluntarily go back to Haiti. If they have to leave, they’ll go someplace else. They want to work. They want to support their family. They don’t want to go back to Haiti.”