SEIU Healthcare Florida Calls for End to Detention and Deportation of Haitian Nationals in the U.S.

Take Action! Call Sec Janet Napolitano and ask her to grant Temporary Protective Status to Haitians in order to keep families united and to save lives. Call (202) 282-8495

March 19, 2009

The Honorable Janet Napolitano
Secretary of Homeland Security
U.S. Department of Homeland Security
Washington, D.C. 20528

Dear Secretary Napolitano,

On behalf of thousands of active and retired members of SEIU in Florida who care deeply about creating justice for all in our communities, we urge you to immediately halt the detention and deportation of Haitian nationals living in the United States and grant them Temporary Protected Status (TPS) as has been awarded to other similarly affected migrants.

Our Haitian members in Florida work and live in the same communities as our Nicaraguan and Salvadoran members who were granted TPS many years ago in the wake of natural disasters and whose protective status was renewed again just months ago.  And yet Haitians have never been granted TPS, despite the fact that last September, Haiti was hit by four storms that killed more than 800 people, left hundreds of thousands homeless, and wreaked havoc on the already unstable economy in terms of damage to agriculture and infrastructure including roads, bridges, water and sanitation systems, schools, hospitals and housing.   

If returned to Haiti, our brothers and sisters would face hunger, homelessness and grave threats to their security, even death.   And the arrival of thousands of deportees on Haiti’s shores would exacerbate the crisis there.  On the other hand, if permitted to remain and granted TPS, they could obtain work permits and increase the flow of remittances to their homeland.  This would provide critical relief—at no cost to U.S. taxpayers—to a nation recovering from what is, according to the United Nations, the worst disaster in 100 years.  

We are confident that your experience dealing with the complexities of immigration in a border state provides you with a unique lens through which to balance the exigencies of rebuilding our economy with a humane, fair, and common sense approach towards revamping misguided immigration policies of the past.  We stand ready to offer any support you may need on the ground in Florida to expedite the process of protecting our Haitian brothers and sisters so as to save lives, keep families together, and rebuild Haiti.

Sincerely,
 
Monica Russo
President