Mullin tells TPS holders to seek permanent status or accept return ticket

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin said Sunday that the roughly 350,000 Haitian and 6,000 Syrian immigrants whose temporary protections the Supreme Court this week allowed the administration to end should either pursue permanent legal status or accept a government-provided ticket and cash grant to return to their home countries.

“Either try to fill out the paperwork and be here underneath a permanent status or we’ll help you get back to your country,” Mullin told CNN’s State of the Union. “We’ll actually give you a plane ticket, plus roughly $2,100 to help you re-establish when you get there, but temporary protective status, according to the courts and in its name itself, is not permanent status.”

The Supreme Court ruled June 25 that the administration could end Temporary Protected Status for an estimated 350,000 Haitian and 6,000 Syrian immigrants, finding that the Haitian plaintiffs contesting the termination were unlikely to prove the administration’s actions were racially biased. The United States first granted TPS to Haitians after a devastating earthquake in 2010 and to Syrians after their country descended into civil war in 2012.

The State Department currently warns U.S. citizens against traveling to either Haiti or Syria, citing widespread violence, crime, terrorism, and kidnapping in both countries.

Immigrant advocates and some elected officials have criticized the decision. Franky Pierre, a Haitian immigrant who came to the U.S. with his family during the 1991 military coup, told the Guardian on Thursday that the ruling would devastate Springfield, Ohio, where Haitian residents have established restaurants and shops.

“For Springfield, it’s going to hurt. When I came here, this area was dead. In this plaza, there are [now] seven Haitian businesses,” Pierre said. “All of these people are going to have to run away or go somewhere, which I’m pretty sure is going to start tonight,” he added, referring to TPS holders.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, called the ruling a “mistake.” “The situation in Haiti could hardly be much worse. The violent gangs run most of the country. The government barely functions,” DeWine said in a statement Thursday. “And the economy is in shambles.” Other Republican members of Congress, including Reps. Mike Lawler of New York and Don Bacon of Nebraska, have also criticized the ruling and called for extensions of Haitian TPS.

During the 2024 presidential campaign, President Trump falsely accused Haitian residents in Springfield of eating household pets, a claim that the Guardian reported triggered bomb threats and white supremacist marches in the city.

Nationwide, 1.7 million people from 17 countries currently hold TPS. Immigration advocates have expressed concern that the Trump administration could seek to dismantle the 1990 program entirely, affecting other nationalities.