‘The Trump administration wants to deport hundreds of thousands of U.S. residents to dangerous countries. And the Supreme Court’s MAGA majority just gave its blessing.
On June 25, the Supreme Court paved the way for the Trump administration to revoke Temporary Protected Status (TPS) from 350,000 migrants from Haiti and over 6,000 from Syria.
TPS is a legal status given to migrants from countries the U.S. government agrees are too dangerous to return to. Haiti and Syria certainly fit the description. The State Department warns Americans against traveling to Syria and Haiti “for any reason” due to the risk of crime, terrorism, kidnapping, unrest, hostage taking, and armed conflict.
Yet the court’s conservative majority ruled that courts are prohibited from reviewing whether the administration followed the law in revoking TPS. The “decision that country conditions in Syria and Haiti justified termination of their TPS designations” is exempt from any form of judicial review, the justices claimed.
Interestingly, the Supreme Court did not rule that the administration followed the law, or that conditions in these countries were safe. It simply ruled that these decisions couldn’t be challenged.
The court also rejected the plaintiffs’ claim that terminating TPS for Haitians was racially motivated. For the court’s conservatives, none of President Trump’s past remarks — which include the lie Haitians are “eating the dogs,” “probably have AIDS,” and that Haiti is a “s—hole country” — were “overtly racial.”
Effectively, the Supreme Court has granted the Trump administration the power to unilaterally end TPS for any group at any time for any reason, no matter how prejudiced or flawed.
While this immediately impacts Haitians and Syrians, it puts the lives of everyone with TPS at risk. This includes people from active warzones like Ukraine, Sudan, and Lebanon.
The only hope for these people is that Congress will intervene on their behalf.
Fortunately, even some Republicans understand the gravity of this situation. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine has called the ruling a “mistake.” DeWine warned, “If [Haitians] lose temporary protected status and they no longer can work and the companies can’t employ them, that’s a blow to the economy, that’s a blow to the state.” Ohio is home to a large Haitian migrant population.
Representative Mike Lawler (R-NY) claimed that the decision will “create a crisis in our hospitals, nursing, and in the I/DD [intellectual and developmental disabilities] community” where roughly one-third of Haitian TPS holders work. He called on the Senate to pass his bipartisan bill to extend TPS for Haitians “to address these issues.” That bill passed the House earlier this year.
For all of Trump’s bigotry, migrants remain an indispensable part of the U.S. economy. But beyond these economic considerations, the U.S. has a moral duty to these people — because the dire conditions in many of these countries are the direct result of America’s foreign policy.
Decades of U.S. sanctions and military intervention in Syria helped foment the political and economic instability in the region. Haiti endured years of U.S. colonial occupation and continues to face repeated attempts by our government to undermine their elections and democracy.
TPS is not simply humanitarian aid. It is a form of reparations for those who’ve suffered the consequences of U.S. foreign policy.
Deliberately sending vulnerable, law-abiding people — many of whom have spent decades here — to countries this administration knows are unsafe is nothing less than issuing their death sentences. These people should not be made to suffer and die to satisfy this administration’s xenophobia and racism.
The sheer indifference towards life displayed by the Supreme Court and the Trump administration betray every principle upon which this nation was founded. While there is still time, Congress must enact extensions to protect TPS recipients.
Jordan Liz is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at San José State University. He specializes in issues of race, immigration, and the politics of belonging. This op-ed was distributed by OtherWords.org.
