Senator Eric Schmitt of Missouri is pressing the Department of Homeland Security to immediately dismantle what he calls a mass-migration loophole in the Temporary Protected Status program for Haitians and Syrians in the wake of a pivotal Supreme Court decision.
According to Gateway Pundit, Schmitt issued a sharply worded June 27 letter to Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, urging him to seize the opportunity created by the Courts ruling in Mullin v. Doe, which lifted lower-court injunctions that had blocked the Trump administrations efforts to end TPS for Haiti and Syria. In the letter, Schmitt praised Mullin and the Department for their excellent work implementing President Trumps America First policies to restore border security and put American citizens first, and argued that the legal landscape is now clear for decisive enforcement.
With those injunctions lifted, the Department now has clear authority to proceed with the terminations and deportations previously announced for Haitian and Syrian nationals, Schmitt wrote. These designations covered a substantial populationroughly 350,000 Haitian nationals and several thousand Syrian nationalswhose TPS-based protection from removal and work authorization will end once the terminations take effect.
The senator urged DHS to move quickly to finalize the terminations so deportations can begin in an orderly and timely manner, emphasizing that continued delay only entrenches what was always meant to be a short-term measure. He also pressed the Department to clearly explain the voluntary departure process available through the CBP One mobile app, which allows migrants to report their departure, obtain travel assistance and a financial stipend, and exit the country without arrest or detention.
New DHS data as of March 31, 2025, underscores the sheer size of the TPS apparatus, which now shields 1,297,635 individuals from 17 countries. Venezuela alone accounts for 605,015 beneficiaries, followed by Haiti at 330,735, with additional large contingents from El Salvador, Ukraine, Honduras, and a smaller group of 3,860 Syrians.
Schmitts intervention follows public calls from former Ohio Governor John Kasich, who urged Congress to step in and extend TPS protections for Haitians despite the Supreme Courts ruling. Sen. Schmitt has a better idea.
Ive got a better idea. TPS became another mass-migration loophole. The Supreme Court has now lifted the blockade. Its time to act. Therefore, I am calling on DHS to move fast, finalize the Presidents TPS terminations, and deport those who no longer have legal status. Temporary means temporary.
His demand for rapid deportations comes as Secretary Mullin has signaled a softer line toward some TPS recipients, suggesting on Sunday that migrants who qualify under existing immigration law could seek permanent legal status rather than remain indefinitely in a program designed as a stopgap. For Schmitt and many conservatives, however, the Supreme Courts decision represents a long-awaited chance to restore the original meaning of temporary, close a major backdoor to mass migration, and reassert that American sovereignty and the rule of lawnot activist courts or open-borders lobbyingmust govern U.S. immigration policy.
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