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Biden’s White House has trumpeted its decision to provide and extend Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans as one of (or the only) the administration’s measures addressing the Venezuelan humanitarian crisis. However, just declaring something does not make it happen, and Biden’s mishandling of TPS for Venezuelans has left hundreds of thousands of fleeing Venezuelans in legal limbo.
In March 2021, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) declared Venezuelans were eligible for TPS. This tool would allow them to stay in the United States without fear of being deported and have a right to work in the country for 18 months. The status would be a relief for thousands of Venezuelans in the United States who were fleeing or afraid to return to Venezuela. The White House then renewed TPS earlier this year, extending the program to at least March 2024.
TPS has been one of the only policies Biden has instituted in favor of the Venezuelan population. The administration has in many ways consciously acted against Venezuelans who are coming to the United States: Biden has pressured the Mexican government to install stringent visa requirements for Venezuelans in a (failed) attempt to stimmy the flow of Venezuelan refugees coming to America, and he decided against redesignating TPS to allow people who came after March 2021 to apply for the status.
Biden has touted the TPS for Venezuelans as an outstanding achievement; however, his government has gravely mishandled the approval process (EFE)
In theory, these policies aimed to prevent more Venezuelans from making a dangerous journey through the Southern border toward the United States. However, these policies have been highly ineffectual, the latest CBP data shows more than 30,000 nationwide encounters with Venezuelan nationals in the last two months, and reports have demonstrated that Venezuelans are now making the perilous trip through the Darien Gap to continue their travel, with hundreds dying in the process.
Biden has enacted many failed policies to prevent fleeing Venezuelans from arriving in the United States, and his government has spectacularly mishandled the TPS, leaving dozens of thousands of TPS applicants in legal limbo.
Biden’s mishandling of TPS: backlog and procrastination
The administration has slow-walked almost every single aspect of the TPS processing since the White House made the designation public in March 2021. Just a day after the President declared the measure, his government published the notice of the designation in the Federal Registrar, which is the Federal Government’s official journal. This was the last time the White House was on time when handling the TPS for Venezuelans.
TPS is a status that only lasts for 18 months (subject to renewal), so a quick review of the application is critical for the dozens of thousands of Venezuelans in the United States. However, a quick review of some paperwork seems too much of a task for the Federal bureaucracy.
From October 2021 to March 2022, the latest data from USCIS, the Federal government received more than 240,000 TPS applications. Yet, it only approved 41,885, meaning that more than 83% of TPS applicants had yet to receive an official answer from the federal bureaucracy. Although we are still missing the data for the third quarter of FY2022, it is doubtful that USCIS had approved more than 200,000 applications in three months when it took them six to approve under 42,000. As a result, dozens of thousands of Venezuelans will likely have yet to receive an answer in September, which was the initial expiration date for the TPS.
After six months of receiving and evaluating TPS applications, USCIS only processed 17% of the applications (EFE)
The Biden White House has dragged its feet in the TPS reviewal process and has also procrastinated in issuing new guidance for the TPS renewal process, which is expected to begin in a few weeks.
DHS confirmed in a press release in July this year that the Administration would extend the designation of TPS for Venezuelans until March 2024. However, a press release is worth nothing if the department does not publish the necessary guidelines in the Federal Registrar.
USCIS announced in early July that the instructions for reapplying for both TPS and a renewal of a work authorization permit would be issued in the “forthcoming Federal Register notice” however, more than one month after USCIS announced the TPS renewal, that notice has yet to be published in the Federal Register. The Register is published every weekday except for federal holidays, meaning that either USCIS has a unique calendar saying that July and August are national holidays or they have decided to issue the guidance at the last minute.
This lag between the announcement of a TPS renewal and the actual federal register notice is not common. For example, DHS announced on March 2nd that the TPS for South Sudan would be extended until 2023, and the requirements for the renewal process were published in the Federal Register the next day. The TPS extension for Syria followed the same pattern as South Sudan, with DHS publishing the requirements in the Federal Register one working day after Secretary Mayorkas announced the extension on July 29th of this year.
USCIS, which works under the umbrella of Mayorka’s DHS, has yet to publish the TPS renewal guidelines in the Federal Register (EFE)
Hence, for some strange unexplained reason, while DHS is able to publish in the Federal Register the details of the TPS renewal process for South Sudan and Syria almost immediately, they have been drafting the requirements for Venezuelans for over one month and a half.
This unexplainable delay by USCIS has real consequences, as the Venezuelans who want to renew their TPS and work permits are left in the dark about how to do so. This limbo creates angst, as the expiration dates for their current TPS and work permits are just a couple of weeks away.
Approving TPS for Venezuelans was a demand of years in the making, and the decision of the Biden White House to support it had the potential to help thousands of Venezuelans who have fled the man-made humanitarian crisis in their country. However, the dither and delay of Mayorka’s USCIS have dulled the effectiveness of TPS, as dozens of thousands of Venezuelans are left in limbo. When talking about TPS for Venezuelans, DHS thinks they can govern by press releases and statements instead of doing their job effectively.
Daniel is a Political Science and Economics student from the University of South Florida. He worked as a congressional intern to Rep. Gus Bilirakis (FL-12) from January to May 2020. He also is the head of international analysis at Politiks // Daniel es un estudiante de Cs Políticas y Economía en la Universidad del Sur de la Florida. Trabajo como pasante legislativo para el Representate Gus Bilirakis (FL-12) desde enero hasta mayo del 2020. Daniel también es el jefe de análisis internacional de Politiks.