'We will lose practically everything': Salvadorans devastated by TPS decision

[DonViejo]

By Maria Sacchetti January 8 at 3:00 PM

Oscar Cortez feels like he has an ordinary American life. He carries a Costco card. He roots for the Boston Red Sox. And five days a week, he rises before dawn, pulls on four shirts and two pairs of pants, and ventures into the frigid air to work as a plumber, a good job that pays for his Maryland townhouse and his daughters’ college fund.

The U.S. government opened the door to this life in 2001 when it granted Cortez and about 200,000 other migrants from El Salvador Temporary Protected Status (TPS), a provisional relief from deportation that has allowed them to work legally in the United States for 17 years. On Monday, the federal government announced plans to take it away.

The Trump administration said TPS will expire for Salvadorans by September 2019. The government last year ended the protection for Haitians and Nicaraguans. Hondurans received a six-month extension.

Congress created the temporary status program in 1990 to offer provisional, humanitarian relief for migrants whose homelands were engulfed in war, natural disasters or other extraordinary conditions. Salvadorans were allowed to apply for protected status after two powerful earthquakes devastated the country in 2001. They are the largest group with the status, and the impact of taking it away will be wide-ranging — from Washington to Los Angeles and in the Central American nation itself.

more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/immigration/i-consider-this-my-country-salvadorans-in-us-brace-for-tps-decision/2018/01/07/77914402-f19e-11e7-b3bf-ab90a706e175_story.html

[renate]

1. could this be altered if Democrats win the House and/or Senate?

Or is this just up to the president and the DHS?

[Roland99]

2. Do they have enough time to apply for US citizenship?

Are they even able to?

[WilmywoodNCparalegal]

3. Not really in most cases

First of all, they would need to apply for a green card (permanent residence) first. However, most entered without inspection, which means that getting a green card will be very difficult (assuming they can qualify in the first place, such as marriage to a U.S. citizen or a U.S. citizen child over age 21 sponsoring a parent) without a waiver of inadmissibility (entry without inspection is a bar to permanent residence).

The hotel industry in Las Vegas will be devastated. Trump's place here will also be affected. Many people who work in housekeeping and food & beverage are from El Salvador in TPS status.

[Roland99]

4. Ratfuckers!