Washington D.C., Jan 8, 2018 / 17:10 pm
The Department of Homeland Security announced today that it will terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for nearly 200,000 Salvadoran migrants, leaving an open question as to the future for their 192,000 U.S. citizen children.
With the humanitarian migration program now due to expire in September 2019, many TPS Salvadoran families, who have lived in the U.S. for nearly 20 years, will have to decide whether to separate from their U.S. citizen children or bring them to a country where youth face threats of gang-violence and limited opportunities.
U.S. bishops from California and Texas spoke out about the DHS decision. Bishop Joe Vásquez of Austin, Texas, chairman of the U.S. bishops' migration committee, called the decision "heartbreaking."
"We believe that God has called us to care for the foreigner and the marginalized: 'So you too should love the resident alien, for that is what you were in the land of Egypt' (Deut. 10:19). Our nation must not turn its back on TPS recipients and their families; they too are children of God," he said in a statement.