‘Outrageous': Trump administration move to scale back protections for Venezuelans in US sparks concern in South Florida
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The Trump administration's decision to roll back temporary protected status for Venezuelans living in the U.S. has sparked alarm in the nation's large expatriate community in South Florida.
U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz said Thursday her office has been fielding concerns from individual Venezuelans and community leaders — 'my neighbors and friends' — in the day since the Trump administration announced the move.
Wasserman Schultz, a Democrat who represents south and west Broward County, lives in Weston, which has one of the largest Venezuelan populations in the United States — so big the city is sometimes referred to as Westonzuela.
She said there is potential for great harm from the decision to cancel an extension of temporary protected status for Venezuelans that was granted in the last week of former President Joe Biden's administration.
Temporary protected status, known widely by the acronym TPS, is a humanitarian program that allows people from a designated country to live and work in the U.S. Venezuelans have fled economic chaos and lawlessness under the repressive regimes of President Nicolas Maduro and his predecessor Hugo Chavez.
About 505,000 Venezuelans were covered by TPS in September, according to a report from the Congressional Research Service.
On Wednesday, Trump homeland security secretary Kristi Noem revoked the Biden administration extension — making the announcement on the "Fox & Friends" television show, a favorite news source for Republicans. Restricting immigration was a central theme of Trump's 2024 campaign.
'It's outrageous that President Trump rescinded the extension of TPS that President Biden issued,' Wasserman Schultz said.
'The people who have fled the Maduro regime fled for their lives. Maduro uses oppression and funds from his oil sales to the United States and other countries to engage in terrorism. he aligns himself with the access of evil — Russia, China and Iran — and he is illegally in office,' she said.
'TPS is designed to make sure that people who would fear for their lives and their safety if they return to their country, that we can keep them safe here for a period of time,' Wasserman Schultz said. 'It is dangerous for anyone to be returned to Venezuela, and Trump canceling the TPS for Venezuelans who are here sends them to almost certain harm if he starts deporting them.'
Wasserman Schultz also condemned Noem for the language she used during the "Fox & Friends" announcement, appearing to refer to Venezuelans in the U.S. as 'dirtbags.'
'In fact, the secretary of Homeland Security called those Venezuelans that are my neighbors and friends dirtbags — dirtbags. The disrespect and the vulgarity and the condescension with which Trump and his administration look at people who have fled countries where there's oppression to make a better way of life for themselves and keep their families safe is revolting,' Wasserman Schultz said.
Noem said that the 'people of this country want these dirtbags out,' referring to 'the Venezuelans that are here and members of TDA.' TDA is a reference to the Tren de Aragua, a gang based in Venezuela.
The Biden administration granted TPS to Venezuelans in 2021 and continued it in 2023. Just before leaving office, then homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas extended it until the end of 2026.
'Before he left town, Mayorkas signed an order that said for 18 months they were going to extend this protection to people that are in Temporary Protected Status, which meant they were going to be able to stay here and violate our laws for another 18 months,' Noem said said on "Fox & Friends." 'We stopped that.'
The move means they'd be eligible for earlier deportation than under the Mayorkas order.
Given the large Venezuelan population in South Florida, TPS has long enjoyed bipartisan support in the region. When Biden first granted TPS in 2021, Florida Republicans, who are often outspoken in opposition to repressive regimes such as Venezuela, were supportive.
On Wednesday, after Noem announced and implemented the order rescinding the TPS extension, U.S. Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart, Carlos Giménez and Maria Elvira Salazar, all Florida Republicans, issued a long, somewhat vague 'joint statement regarding Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Venezuelan nationals.'
The statement itself did not comment specifically, positively or negatively, on the Trump administration's action on TPS, and didn't use the term or the acronym.
'The regime of Nicolás Maduro is one of the world's most repressive dictatorships, and its mounting failures have led to one of the largest migration crises in history, with millions of Venezuelans being forced to flee the brutal and oppressive regime. As a result, many Venezuelans have arrived in our country and have integrated into our communities, respecting our laws and contributing to the prosperity of our great country,' they said.
But, they added, 'some individuals such as members of the Tren de Aragua have exploited our generosity and flouted our laws.'
They said Trump 'has shown steadfast and unwavering solidarity with the Venezuelan people.' And they said they would 'do everything possible to ensure that those seeking freedom from persecution and oppression are protected.'
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