Venezuelan migrants in South Florida say they feel betrayed by the Trump administration’s decision to end legal protections for hundreds of thousands of people who fled dictatorships and sought refuge in the U.S.
New regulations scheduled to be published this week would end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for more than 300,000 Venezuelans in early April.
Protections for a second group of some 250,000 Venezuelans are currently extended through September but now also seem likely to be removed.
The move by the Trump administration is a turnabout of a long-standing U.S. policy that has extended TPS to more than a half million Venezuelans.
On NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said she believed the designation had been abused.
She said: “Remember, Venezuela purposely emptied out their prisons, emptied out their mental health facilities and sent them to the United States of America.”
Venezuelans started migrating in large numbers to the U.S. in the 1980’s. The numbers surged in recent decades as people fled the political and economic turmoil of the authoritarian regimes of Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro.
Nearly 400,000 people who left Venezuela now live in Florida.
Adelys Ferro, the director of the Venezuelan American Caucus, said many members of their community voted for Trump yet they now face deportations.
Ferro said, “We are human beings who work here, who are small business owners.”
Ferro added that Venezuelans exiled here “actually believe that the TPS was the right way to get legal in the United States, to have our work permits, to have a social security number, to be able to buy a house.”
Florida’s largest Venezuelan population is in Doral, a Miami suburb. Ferro and other activists held a press event there on Monday, Feb. 3, but didn’t want any TPS recipients to speak out. They were worried they could be targeted for deportation by federal immigration authorities.
In the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump won the vote in Miami-Dade County, helped largely by the Hispanic vote, including naturalized Venezuelan Americans.
That’s one reason why Ferro and many others there say they’re shocked and disappointed.
“Beyond betrayed,” Ferro said. “They used us. During the campaign, the elected officials from the Republican Party, they actually told us that he was not going to touch the documented people. They said, ‘No, it is with undocumented people.'”
Carlos Pereira, a Venezuelan-American who lives in Doral, says many of his friends and neighbours are frantic about the impending policy change. “They’re frustrated,” he said. “They’re scared, they (take) cover, hide.” For them, he says eliminating TPS “would be a tragedy.”
Noem noted in the draft rule that it’s not in American national interests to permit the Venezuelans to remain in the U.S. That broad determination may be worrying not just to Venezuelans, but also to people from Haiti, Nicaragua and more than a dozen other countries that currently have temporary protected status.
Watch the Venezuelan Americans speak in the video below.
Well Well Well #Venezuelan #Americans feel betrayed in South #Florida and react to #Trump rescinding TPS (Temporary Protected Status) for 350,000 Venezuelans. All I can say is #wetriedtotellya pic.twitter.com/EWucWIyTu8
— BMB Empower Network (@BmbEmpower) February 4, 2025
