In an op-ed distributed by the Tribune News Service, Héctor Figueroa, President of 32BJ SEIU, laments on the severe consequences that follow Trump’s termination of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for over 300,000 people working legally in the U.S. 32BJ SEIU is the largest property services union in the nation. The op-ed is available here.
An excerpt of Figueroa’s op-ed is below:
The Trump administration’s decisions to end the program for these countries came despite recommendations from career diplomats and other State Department personnel to extend it.
So now, TPS holders are facing the possibility of losing their homes and businesses, being separated from the families they’ve raised here, and destabilizing the communities they’ve built.
Deporting hundreds of thousands of U.S. residents back to some of the most dangerous countries in the Western hemisphere is not just an affront to American values, but a self-defeating strategy that will have negative consequences at home.
A 2016 Cornell University study found that communities with increased deportations had more foreclosures. TPS holders have a high rate of home ownership – almost one in three – and sending them home would be a disaster for the communities where many of them live.
