The Trump administration said on Monday it is ending a temporary residency permit programme that has allowed almost 60,000 citizens from Haiti to live and work in the United States since a 2010 powerful earthquake shook the Caribbean nation.
The Homeland Security Department said conditions in Haiti have improved significantly, so the benefit will be extended one last time — until July 2019 — to give Haitians time to prepare to return home.
“Since the 2010 earthquake, the number of displaced people in Haiti has decreased by 97 per cent,” the department said in a press release. “Haiti is able to safely receive traditional levels of returned citizens.”
Advocates and members of Congress from both parties had asked the Trump administration for an 18-month extension of the programme, known as Temporary Protected Status.
Haitian President Jovenel Moise’s government also requested the extension.
