Truthout is an indispensable resource for activists, movement leaders and workers everywhere. Please make this work possible with a quick donation.

Mass arrests of Haitian immigrants by federal agents could begin as early as this week, according to federal documents regarding President Donald Trump’s new directive to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement following the right-wing majority on the Supreme Court’s ruling that Trump could end deportation protections for the community.

A binding mandate was expected to be sent to lower courts on Monday regarding the high court’s decision last month that held the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) could strip 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians of their Temporary Protected Status (TPS), which is granted to migrants from certain countries facing disasters, armed conflicts, or other conditions that would put immigrants in danger if they were forced to return there.

After the mandate is transmitted, Haitians across the country will lose their ability to legally live and work in the US, and the administration is reportedly already planning to send ICE agents into states including Ohio — where Haitian communities were targeted by Trump and Vice President JD Vance during the 2024 election — to quickly arrest and deport migrants to their crisis-stricken home country.

Jean Négot Bonheur Delva, director-general of Haiti’s National Office of Migration, told the Haitian Times this month that according to the U.S. embassy in the Caribbean country, about 250 former TPS beneficiaries could be forced back to Haiti on flights each week.

Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, emphasized that the reported operation targeting Haitian communities is just the latest evidence that Trump is rounding up people who have been living and working in the U.S. for years, despite the White House’s claims that it is going after “the worst of the worst.”

Judge Halts Noem Move to End TPS for Haitians, Citing Trump Admin’s Racial Bias

They said they were going after “the worst of the worst.” Instead, ICE........

© Truthout