What’s coming next

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MARY REICHARD, HOST: Today is Thursday, January 8th.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Mary Reichard.

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: And I’m Myrna Brown.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: The end of Temporary Protected Status.

For some 350,000 Haitians, who can no longer live or work legally in the U.S., change is coming.

It’s likely to have a large impact on places like Springfield, Ohio. That’s where thousands of Haitian migrants settled in the last few years, building lives, but also stressing the town’s infrastructure and resources.

REICHARD: Here’s WORLD’s Maria Baer.

SOUND: [Baby crying, chatter]

MARIA BAER: The St. Vincent de Paul Community Center in downtown Springfield is bustling. Director Casey Rollins jokes that it’s one of their “slow” days — before bending down to tie a Haitian woman’s unruly shoelaces.

ROLLINS: Have you ever seen those shoes that you slip in?

At a table in the back of the room, near a plastic-looking statue of Jesus in a red robe, a Haitian woman sits quietly. We’re calling her Mary to protect her privacy. Through an interpreter named Patrick — another Haitian migrant — Mary says she’s due at immigration court in a few days.

AUDIO: [Mary speaking in Creole]

TRANSLATOR: The plan I have right now, I was pending asylum, but for my other child who doesn’t have this, they asking her to go to court because she doesn’t have anything, she didn’t qualify for the Temporary Protect Status.

Mary’s saying her daughter doesn’t qualify for TPS, or Temporary Protected Status, because she was born in Chile. Although Mary originally fled Haiti, she lived in Chile before she came here. She came to the U.S., she says, for better economic opportunities.

She has no plans to leave in February.

TRANSLATOR: The people say they are really scared about the situation, but for herself she say she not fully care that much. Let it be! She doesn’t… let it be. It is what it is.

Behind Mary and Patrick, about a dozen Haitian migrants are waiting on plastic chairs near St. Vincent de Paul’s front doors. Some are bouncing toddlers on their knees; others scroll on their phones. They’re waiting to log on to one of two available desktop computers, where Patrick or another translator will help them apply for asylum or check on their application status.

Director Casey Rollins isn’t optimistic.

ROLLINS: People are still thinking along the lines of hoping to remain here. And as Americans we wish that we had that same kind of hope for them. But we are seeing the realities.

TPS for Haitian migrants began under President Obama after the devastating 2010 earthquake. It was supposed to last 18 months. But it’s been extended several times since then, as presidential administrations from Trump to Biden cited circumstances like Hurricane Sandy, rampant gang violence, and political volatility in Haiti as justifying the emergency status.

The current Trump administration has tried to end TPS for Haiti before, but their efforts were tangled up in court. Most officials believe this February will mark the official end.

Rollins doubts many migrants will go back to Haiti.

ROLLINS: So we’ve been talking about, what is a third country? And if there’s a third country we can go to, you know like Chile or Brazil or somewhere like that, that we would maybe help them to talk to that country about going there. But you know you can’t just go to a third country.

To qualify for Temporary Protected Status, migrants had to prove they were Haitian nationals, but they didn’t have to prove they came to the U.S. directly from Haiti. Many traveled through—or lived in—other Latin American countries before crossing the U.S. border.

Chile in particular relaxed its immigration restrictions for Haitians after the 2010 earthquake and became a popular destination because of its growing economy. By 2017, an estimated 120,000 Haitians had moved there.

That includes Sagini, another woman waiting in the St. Vincent de Paul lobby. She was 24 when she fled Haiti. That was over ten years ago. She now speaks Spanish.

SAGINI: I was 24 years old, and I went to the Dominican Republic. I spent a year there and from there bought my ticket to Chile).

Sagini lived and worked in Chile for nine years. She says she came to the U.S. last year for the same reason as Mary: to find a better-paying job.

SAGINI: In Chile I had to work for little money. And sometimes there was no pay… or I’d work all day for twenty, thirty dollars.

In 2017, Chile’s government once again tightened restrictions on Haitian migration. That’s the same year Haitians began arriving in large numbers in Springfield. Though most of them qualified for Temporary Protected Status, the pattern suggests many weren’t directly fleeing Haiti. Many, like Sagini, hadn’t been there in years.

Sagini says she has no plans to go back now.

SAGINI: Maybe soon the President will change his mind. I don’t know.

Casey Rollins of St. Vincent de Paul says government officials have warned her that immigration raids are likely in Springfield in February.

HUSTED: Overall the terms under which hundreds of thousands of people came here was that it would be temporary, while there was an effort to pursue a more stable environment in Haiti…

U.S. Senator Jon Husted, a Republican from Ohio, says the end of TPS shouldn’t be a surprise.

HUSTED: I think everybody has known what the terms were for quite a while now and I’m assuming they have been taking the proper preparations for a return to Haiti or have been pursuing another option if that’s what they want to pursue.

Rollins says the uncertainty has left more local migrants needing help. But St. Vincent de Paul hasn’t had to turn anyone away, because increased attention on the situation has brought in more donations, too.

Still, local residents report lengthy wait times for medical care and rent increases since the influx of migrants began. Most of the Haitian migrants have Medicaid, including Sagini, even though she doesn’t have TPS or any other legal status. A spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Medicaid told WORLD there are legal exceptions allowing all pregnant women and children to obtain Medicaid.

For migrants like Mary, the future is uncertain.

TRANSLATOR: I have no idea right now where to go because I don’t want to go back to Haiti because I once left Haiti for violence I think if I go back there my life gonna be in danger. I thinking about Chile too but the reason why I don’t want to go back to Chile, while I was there I tried to get some documentation, I never got it so don’t have any idea what to do right now.

It’s unlikely that all of the estimated 16,000 Haitians in Springfield will leave town by February 4th, either by choice or by force. But local and state leaders say change is coming.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Maria Baer in Springfield, Ohio.

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