Washington D.C. - Colorado U.S. Senator Michael Bennet signed a letter, along with 57 members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, calling on the Trump administration to reverse its recent decision to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for nationals of Nicaragua and Sudan, extend TPS for the remaining eight nations that are currently designated, and continue to designate other countries for TPS as warranted by particular conditions.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) recently terminated TPS for nationals of Nicaragua and Sudan, removing their legal protection and exposing them to deportation back to dangerous countries. The lawmakers urged DHS Secretary Elaine Duke to reverse this decision, writing that the decision would tear apart families and harm national security interests.
"Notwithstanding your decision to terminate TPS for Nicaragua and Sudan, we believe that the conditions in each of the countries currently designated for TPS provide ample statutory justification for extending the designation for each of these countries," the senators wrote. "If the Administration disagrees, we urge you to work with Congress to pass legislation providing a pathway to U.S. citizenship for TPS beneficiaries from these countries. To do otherwise would harm our national security interests by undermining the fragile security in these countries. It also would negatively impact hundreds of thousands of American children, workers, and employers."
The lawmakers also called on the Administration to extend TPS for the remaining eight countries currently designated, including El Salvador, Honduras, and Haiti, which comprise more than 90% of current TPS recipients. The TPS program provides safety in the United States to approximately 437,000 people from 10 countries and their families.