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Carlos* was warned that he would go to prison if he returned to Venezuela.
He was a public official and was an investigator for the Venezuelan scientific police for almost 20 years. When he was seconded to Interpol, he investigated cases of drug trafficking, homicides and financial crimes.
He says that in the last case he arrested two Venezuelans who were committing digital scams in the United States and Venezuela. But because they were linked to the Venezuelan government, he says he was ordered to release them and not report the investigation to Interpol.
“I left Venezuela because I couldn’t stand any more threats and humiliation,” he says. “I had to leave my wife and two daughters.”
Carlos entered the United States on his tourist visa in March. For the last six months he has lived off his savings and selling goods in Venezuela, without being able to work legally because he is undocumented.
However, the decision by President Joe Biden’s government to grant Temporary Protected Status (TPS) to almost half a million Venezuelans opened a path for them to work legally.
“This measure is a blessing because it will allow me to process my asylum request and at the same time work to make money and bring my family,” he tells BBC Mundo.
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Caption,
Hundreds of migrants line up in New York to formalize their asylum applications.
The TPS offers a temporary exemption from deportation and access to work permits for 18 months to 472,000 Venezuelans who have entered the United States until July 31 of this year.
Those who have arrived after that date “will be expelled when it is determined that they do not have a legal basis to stay,” the Secretary of Homeland Security of the United States, Alejandro Mayorkas, clarified in a statement.
TPS “provides people already in the United States with protection against removal when conditions in their home country prevent their safe return,” Mayorkas said.
“That is the situation in which Venezuelans who arrived here on July 31 of this year or before find themselves.”
This is the largest grant of this immigration status for citizens of the same nationality in the United States, almost double the 243,000 Venezuelans who already have this status since 2021.
To understand the importance of the massive granting of TPS to almost half a million Venezuelans, we must look at the previous figures: so far 610,000 migrants of 16 nationalities, including Salvadorans, Hondurans and Nicaraguans, work in the United States under this status, according to the organization. National Migration Forum.
That figure will almost double with the new TPS intended only for Venezuelans, who represent the majority of migrants arriving in the United States at this time.
These migrants escape the economic, social and political situation of Venezuela or other countries where they lived before embarking on the journey to the United States.
The number also reveals the Biden government’s support for Venezuelan migrants, for whom approximately a year ago it created a legal process to arrive in the country by plane for which a sponsor who lives legally in the United States is required.
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Caption,
The measure was announced by the US Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas.
“A golden opportunity”
John de La Vega, a lawyer specialized in immigration law in the United States, believes that TPS will have “an enormous positive impact for tens of thousands of Venezuelans who are in asylum applications, deportation proceedings or appeals.”
“The government has realized that due to the delays that exist in immigration courts in asylum cases, offering this protection speeds up for Venezuelans both the possibility of legalizing themselves and processing a work permit.”
However, he warns that it is important to advise Venezuelans who can benefit from TPS, given that thousands refrained from applying for this immigration status in 2021 due to lack of knowledge of English and US laws.
“We must now emphasize explaining to Venezuelans, especially those who have more vulnerable conditions, that this is a golden opportunity that they should take advantage of,” says Helene Villalonga, a Venezuelan activist for the human rights of migrants in the state of Florida.
“They have to understand that TPS is insurance, a guarantee that they will not be deported.”
Villalonga believes that this decision may dissuade many Venezuelans from intending to emigrate to the United States in the remainder of the year, given that those who arrived after July 31 will not receive the status.
On the contrary, activist Patricia Andrade, director of the organization Venezuela Awareness Foundation, fears that the TPS will promote the arrival of more Venezuelan migrants, with the expectation that a new executive decision will be approved that will benefit them in the future.
“We are seeing the southern border crowded with Venezuelan migrants. They have nowhere to return, so for many the best option is to enter the United States, even if it is irregularly.”
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Caption,
A Venezuelan migrant with her children in Texas.
The pressure of New York
The Biden government’s decision responds above all to pressure from New York Mayor Eric Adams and Democratic legislators, given the arrival of more than 100,000 migrants to the city during the last year. It is estimated that about half are Venezuelans.
This flow unleashed a crisis that forced tens of thousands of migrants to be housed in more than 200 hotels, shelters, tents and other facilities.
Andrew Heinrich directs the Rousseau Project, an initiative that provides assistance to migrants and promotes education among young people in disadvantaged areas of New York.
In his 12 years of working with migrant communities, he had never before seen a situation like that of Venezuelans in New York.
“We believe that the TPS will have an enormous impact in relieving the pressure that the arrival of Venezuelan migrants generated in the city’s immigration, social and educational assistance services,” he says from New York.
In recent months, Adams launched a leaflet campaign to persuade migrants to leave for other cities and offered to set up a shelter for 2,000 people, the largest migrant shelter that has ever existed in the city.
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Caption,
The mayor of New York, Eric Adams, demanded for months the help of the federal government to confront the immigration crisis.
Adams blamed the federal and state governments for not providing enough help to New York to offer housing and other social services to newcomers.
Under the slogan “Let them work,” Adams and other Democratic leaders called for more budget to cover assistance to migrants and the construction of new infrastructure.
“I want to thank President Biden for listening to our coalition, including our congressional delegation, and taking this important step that will bring hope to the thousands of Venezuelan asylum seekers currently in our care,” the mayor said last week in response. to the decision.
In a joint statement, Senate Democratic Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, both of New York, said the measure is a “welcome step” that will “provide relief necessary to New York’s systems that strive to support newly arrived migrants.
“The decision will also substantially reduce the cost to New York taxpayers with respect to housing asylum seekers,” the statement added.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said that while there is “more work to do,” state officials are ready to “immediately” begin the process of “registering people to work and getting them jobs so they can be self-sufficient.” “.
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Caption,
New York authorities waged an intense campaign to demand Biden’s support.
Venezuelans in US politics
New York is a “sanctuary city,” as localities are known where laws were passed to protect the rights of undocumented immigrants.
Therefore, the authorities are obliged to offer assistance to all migrants who require it.
States led by Republican governors in the south of the country have been sending thousands of migrants to cities governed by Democrats in protest of border policies, which they criticize as lax and for which they blame Biden.
In fact, last October Adams declared a state of emergency in New York when shelters began to fill with migrants arriving on buses after crossing the border in Texas or Arizona.
Republican leaders maintain that this measure seeks to increase pressure on Biden to tighten the blockade on the southern border of the United States and prevent the entry of migrants from Mexico.
Republicans are celebrating the apparent success of their political maneuver as they see that Democrats like Mayor Adams have joined the chorus of criticism and calls for help from the Biden administration in Washington.
The United Nations Refugee Agency estimates that more than seven million people have left Venezuela in recent years due to the collapse of the economy under the government of President Nicolás Maduro, who has been in power since 2013.
Many of these Venezuelans are in the United States, which has become the ideal destination, which is why they are even willing to risk their lives on a difficult journey through Latin America, through the dangerous Darien Gap, Central America and Mexico until they reach border.
Venezuelans are leading an immigration pressure that has made them an issue of national politics in the United States.
The Republicans attack the Democratic president and now the Democrats themselves also demand action in the face of a flow of migrants that pushes the resources of cities and states to the limit.
With just over a year to go until the elections, Biden responds with the largest granting of work permits in history through the TPS, recognizing the crisis that is being experienced in some areas of the country and meeting the demands of Venezuelan migrants, who are now They will be able to work to fend for themselves.
*His true identity was changed to protect him from retaliation.
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2023-09-25 07:00:00
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