Thousands of Haitians living in Florida under humanitarian protections could be deported because of a Thursday ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
Immigration advocates worry that the ruling will tear apart communities that have been living in Florida and the U.S. for more than a decade and cripple industries that have relied on them for years.<\/p>\n
The decision<\/p>\n
Thursday\u2019s decision centers on the Temporary Protected Status<\/a> designation, or TPS, a humanitarian protection that the U.S. codified in 1990.<\/p>\n TPS allows vetted immigrants already living in America to remain and work here legally if the U.S. has determined that it would be dangerous to return to their home country. The designation is temporary, often set in six-month increments, but the Secretary of Homeland Security can extend the designations.<\/p>\n The designation has been supported by presidents of both parties since its inception. As of last March, it applied to 17 countries, including Haiti, El Salvador, Ukraine, Syria and other countries, with nearly 600,000 people covered by the designation as of the latest public data from March of 2025.<\/p>\n Immigrants from Haiti make up more than half of TPS holders nationally.<\/p>\n Since President Donald Trump began his second term last year, he has surged immigration enforcement operations nationwide, and on his first day in office he directed his cabinet<\/a> to limit the scope and length of most of the country\u2019s TPS designations, including Haiti\u2019s. But lower courts blocked him from making those changes.<\/p>\n But in the Supreme Court\u2019s decision Thursday in Mullin v. Doe, the court sided with the Trump administration: Lower courts cannot interfere in the executive branch\u2019s ability to rescind TPS designations.<\/p>\n The court\u2019s decision on Thursday won\u2019t affect immigrants staying in the U.S. under other programs, according to Anne Piervil, an Orlando immigration attorney, such as those who have become naturalized citizens, hold green cards or are protected asylum seekers from trafficking or violence.<\/p>\n But it could affect more than 158,000 Haitians \u2014 and other immigrants \u2014 living in Florida under TPS, should the administration choose to begin mass deportations, according to TPS data compiled<\/a> by the Haitian Bridge Alliance, an immigration nonprofit.<\/p>\n Following the court\u2019s ruling, TPS will lapse for Haitians at the end of the month.<\/p>\n Florida roots<\/p>\n Thursday\u2019s ruling is particularly meaningful in Florida, which as of 2022 was home to about half of the country\u2019s Haitian population, according to U.S. Census data compiled by the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute<\/a>.<\/p>\n Central Florida, at that time, had the fourth-largest Haitian population nationally, with an estimated 41,000 people living here with a green card, TPS or other forms of legal residence.<\/p>\n Haiti has been covered by Temporary Protected Status designation since 2010, when a catastrophic earthquake destroyed national infrastructure. Widespread unrest and crime have wracked the country since 2018.<\/p>\n Many Haitians living in Florida with TPS have been here for more than a decade, according to Piervil, long enough to find careers, start families, buy homes and find a community here.<\/p>\n Piervil herself is Haitian-American. She called the ruling \u201cvery shocking.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI was born and raised here in Central Florida, but I have family, I have friends, I have colleagues, and they will all be affected,\u201d Piervil said. \u201cI mean, as a community, \u2026 we are deeply saddened. \u2026 We don\u2019t believe justice was served in this opinion.\u201d<\/p>\n She also expects that deportations would have effects on the hospitality, tourism and health care industries, where Haitians, and Haitian with TPS, make up a large part of the workforce.<\/p>\n \u201cOur medical care \u2014 so, from home aid nurses to LPNs to our senior citizen homes \u2014 will be greatly affected,\u201d said Piervil. \u201cA lot of medical staff are Haitian TPS holders; also, our educators and our farm workers.\u201d<\/p>\n A \u201cdeath sentence\u201d<\/p>\n The possibility of deportations raises the question of who, exactly, would be responsible for housing.<\/p>\n At the time of the decision, the U.S. Department of State had a travel advisory<\/a> in place warning against travel to Haiti because of dangerous conditions.<\/p>\n The department designated Haiti with its most severe rating, \u201cDo Not Travel,\u201d citing \u201cthe risk of crime, terrorism, kidnapping, unrest, and limited health care.\u201d That\u2019s the same designation<\/a> it\u2019s given to Ukraine, Iran and Somalia.<\/p>\n Felipe Sousa-Lazaballet conducts informational sessions with immigrant communities as the executive director of the Home CommUnity Center in Apopka. Sending Haitian TPS holders back home would be a \u201cdeath sentence,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n (Sousa-Lazaballet is Democratic candidate running for a House seat in the Florida Legislature.)<\/p>\n Congressional pushback<\/p>\n At a press conference on Friday in front of The Kingdom Church, a Haitian church in Orlando, U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost, a Democrat representing Florida\u2019s 10th Congressional District, denounced the decision.<\/p>\n \u201cTemporary [Protected] Status represents one of America’s highest ideals,\u201d Frost said. \u201cIt says that when people cannot return home because of war, political instability, humanitarian catastrophe, we offer them temporary protection until it is safe. It is not safe in Haiti. It is not safe in Syria.\u201d<\/p>\n Frost also said enforcing deportations could rip communities and families apart.<\/p>\n \u201cThey are scared that they are going to be detained tomorrow, or they feel like maybe they need to self-deport tomorrow, but \u2026 they want their kids to continue to go to school here and be here with their friends and their family and the life that they’ve built,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is separating families. It will separate families.\u201d<\/p>\n A legislative out<\/p>\n