House Appropriations Committee Rejects Lowey Amendment to Protect TPS Recipients

Click here to watch Lowey’s remarks on her amendment to protect TPS recipients.

WASHINGTON, DC – Congresswoman Nita Lowey (D-NY17/Rockland-Westchester), Ranking Member on the House Appropriations Committee, on Wednesday offered an amendment during the Fiscal Year 2019 Homeland Security appropriations bill markup that would have prevented the Trump Administration from ending relief for the nearly 440,000 Temporary Protected Status (TPS) recipients living in the United States. The Appropriations Committee rejected Lowey’s amendment on a vote of 21 to 25, with all committee Democrats voting in favor of the amendment. 

“For those who have met strict qualifications and are able to live, work, and travel in the United States, TPS has been a lifeline. And our country has benefitted greatly from their contributions,” said Congresswoman Lowey. “Recipients have made decades of investments in our communities, contributing to our economy, paying taxes, and raising families. In fact, TPS holders are parents to roughly 275,000 American children.  Unfortunately, due to the Trump Administration’s misguided and political decision to end TPS, these individuals face the heart-wrenching decision to either uproot their families or face deportation to unstable countries.”

Lowey’s amendment would have prevented any funding in the Homeland Security appropriations bill from being used to arrest, detain, place into removal proceedings, remove or deny work authorization to holders of TPS.

“We have a moral obligation to maintain TPS for people who have lived and worked in our communities for decades, and who have no safe home to return to,” added Lowey. “Their children go to school alongside ours, they own homes in our neighborhoods, contribute to our economy, own small businesses and are paying taxes. It is inhumane to force these families who have built lives in the U.S. to suddenly leave for an uncertain, and potentially dangerous future.”

Over the past year, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has terminated TPS for several countries, including Haiti, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, despite warnings from the department’s own intelligence analysts that ending the program would cause illegal immigration to spike.

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