Very grateful once again for your excellent reporting. This aspect of the immigration story is so underreported. People talk about the effect agriculture if we lose Mexican workers and whatnot but rarely emphasize how many elders are at risk as well.
I’m Canadian, a retired physician, 66. But even from here, or especially from here, I knew that the “deportation goals”, of the U.S. would be a disaster in the Nursing-Home, Home Care, and Assisted Living communities. My Mom is now 94, in advanced Dementia: between advanced arthritis and the Dementia, she also cannot walk, she has a 25 yr tremor also and needs to be fed; so, she is in a Nursing Home. For 7 yrs before that, she was in a Retirement Home (chose it herself, when she could not cook safely after a bad broken wrist). In both homes, the staff is 50%+ (1st-generation or 2nd-gen.) immigrants-to-Canada: from S.Asia, from Philippines, from Nigeria, or the Caribbean. Thank Heaven, Canada accepts immigrants, who are eager to do this work! There’s already a lot of need, for such immigrants. And when the peak BabyBoom, e.g. “me” born 1960, like millions of others (!) are 80+ yrs-old (2040+), the need will be “severe”. Many people of my generation, including all 3 of my siblings, had zero-children (though, it’s a worse problem in the U.S., that the childless middle-class don’t want any tax- money going towards ChildCare or parental-leave. Though, hey!, they DO need “other people” to have children, so that there are care-givers when they become frail-elderly.)
At some point, all the “Developed” and population-collapsing countries, they will be competing for able-bodied, working-age (& reproductive-age) immigrants. All the available immigrants, will be SubSaharan Africans. All the followers of The Stephens (Miller & Bannon, and their type) will have their heads exploding.
Jonathan, I appreciate this piece very much. As a gerontologist and an aging activist, this is an issue that is deeply concerning to me. For older adults “aging in place” in their own homes as well as those residing in assisted living settings, highly skilled and compassionate carers are essential. And as you’ve amplified, often these carers are people who have come to the US with the hope for a better, safer, more secure life. The other aspect of your piece that really moved me is the loving friendship between Esther and Maryse. Caring for another at the end of their life can be sacred and beautiful work - if often invisible and under-appreciated work.
I have always had this huge issue with Temporary Protected Status: that the "Temporary" part of the name has been almost always been dismissed with a wink and a nod by those responsible for administering it. That's not the fault of the people living on TPS, it's the fault of the Congress. They should define, and should have defined long ago, what "temporary" means, and set up a system for regular periodic case evaluations of whether it's still applicable. Since Congress failed to do that, they've left it to the Executive Branch to fill in the gaps, which they've mostly done by making TPS into an alternate immigration system under another name.
So now we have an openly racist Administration that wants to reverse the policies of all previous Administrations in the most arbitrary and cruelest ways that they can, because hurting as many dark-skinned and/or foreign born people as possible is their brand. In the short term, the courts should recognize that hundreds of thousands of people have based their life planning on past policies, and they aren't responsible for the government's past negligence or current savagery. For everyone currently on TPS, this Administration should be required to follow the policies that were in place when they took office. Any changes that they want to make should only apply prospectively to new grants of TPS.
And when this nightmare finally ends, fixing TPS should be one more high-priority item for the first post-Trump Congress to fix.
South Florida, Palm Beach County in particular is and always has been a primarily service based place to live. The Haitian community does in fact fill almost all of our health care worker positions and they are excellent at what they do. With the ever growing number of elderly here and even those who aren't, they fill a need no one else will do. As Esther pointed out, they mow our lawns, pick our vegetables, work in food service.. you get my point. This county has an extremely wealthy population that also depends on the immigrant community. This nonsense with him peeves the beans out of me. Thanks for putting this front and center. I hope you continue to do so, because it's a huge issue that will have a horrific impact not just here but across the country. Thanks.
Maybe people in Florida should have voted for Clinton or Harris. I feel for the Haitian immigrants because they had no so, but the rest of Florida, in the words of their dominant party, fafo
As an RN. My entire life’s work. iCU and then OR Trauma we never chose one patient over another it was the SEVERITY OF WHO WAS HURT THE WORST AND WHO WAS IN MOST DANGEROUS IF WE DELAYED CARE.
EVERY HRALTH PERSON ON MY LEVEL KNOWS THAT EVERY INDIVIDUAL HAS A RIGHT TO HRALTH CARE.
I would stand before congress myself and tell the world story after story those sitting above us need to understand .
Good lord this is not difficult thinking.
I do advocate zero HRALTH care for all of congress and anyone in cabinent positions. They need to live like the rest of us to understand
Thanks for this article Jonathan. I hope MANY people read (and watch) it! (and we need little Cindy Lou to ask the orange Grinch Why Mr. Grinch Why? and make his heart grow and grow - or maybe easier the Grinchy/Trumpy Senators)
This may be naive, not the first time for me. However it seems this is the lynch pin the Supremes have to rule on:
"TPS comes from a 1990 immigration overhaul that passed with strong bipartisan support and was signed into law by George H.W. Bush. The TPS provisions in effect codified what had already been a common practice, carried out previously on executive authority alone. It allowed foreign nationals to remain in the United States if armed conflict, natural disaster, or other “extraordinary and temporary conditions” made it unsafe for them to return."
If they decide the last sentence no longer applies, which I think is the Feds argument. It comes down to intepretation of these words based on current conditions in Haiti (in this case). Not sure that is a case law issue, which is, at least to me, not a good sign
Thank you, Jonathan. I'm just speechless at the cruelty and harm this would inflict on everyone, from the care givers and their families to the patients and the families who absolutely rely on them.
Very grateful once again for your excellent reporting. This aspect of the immigration story is so underreported. People talk about the effect agriculture if we lose Mexican workers and whatnot but rarely emphasize how many elders are at risk as well.
What is the bill number so I can email my senators?
Jonathon is the best
I’m Canadian, a retired physician, 66. But even from here, or especially from here, I knew that the “deportation goals”, of the U.S. would be a disaster in the Nursing-Home, Home Care, and Assisted Living communities. My Mom is now 94, in advanced Dementia: between advanced arthritis and the Dementia, she also cannot walk, she has a 25 yr tremor also and needs to be fed; so, she is in a Nursing Home. For 7 yrs before that, she was in a Retirement Home (chose it herself, when she could not cook safely after a bad broken wrist). In both homes, the staff is 50%+ (1st-generation or 2nd-gen.) immigrants-to-Canada: from S.Asia, from Philippines, from Nigeria, or the Caribbean. Thank Heaven, Canada accepts immigrants, who are eager to do this work! There’s already a lot of need, for such immigrants. And when the peak BabyBoom, e.g. “me” born 1960, like millions of others (!) are 80+ yrs-old (2040+), the need will be “severe”. Many people of my generation, including all 3 of my siblings, had zero-children (though, it’s a worse problem in the U.S., that the childless middle-class don’t want any tax- money going towards ChildCare or parental-leave. Though, hey!, they DO need “other people” to have children, so that there are care-givers when they become frail-elderly.)
At some point, all the “Developed” and population-collapsing countries, they will be competing for able-bodied, working-age (& reproductive-age) immigrants. All the available immigrants, will be SubSaharan Africans. All the followers of The Stephens (Miller & Bannon, and their type) will have their heads exploding.
Jonathan, I appreciate this piece very much. As a gerontologist and an aging activist, this is an issue that is deeply concerning to me. For older adults “aging in place” in their own homes as well as those residing in assisted living settings, highly skilled and compassionate carers are essential. And as you’ve amplified, often these carers are people who have come to the US with the hope for a better, safer, more secure life. The other aspect of your piece that really moved me is the loving friendship between Esther and Maryse. Caring for another at the end of their life can be sacred and beautiful work - if often invisible and under-appreciated work.
I hope that Esther contacts her senators and encourages her family and friends to do the same.
I have always had this huge issue with Temporary Protected Status: that the "Temporary" part of the name has been almost always been dismissed with a wink and a nod by those responsible for administering it. That's not the fault of the people living on TPS, it's the fault of the Congress. They should define, and should have defined long ago, what "temporary" means, and set up a system for regular periodic case evaluations of whether it's still applicable. Since Congress failed to do that, they've left it to the Executive Branch to fill in the gaps, which they've mostly done by making TPS into an alternate immigration system under another name.
So now we have an openly racist Administration that wants to reverse the policies of all previous Administrations in the most arbitrary and cruelest ways that they can, because hurting as many dark-skinned and/or foreign born people as possible is their brand. In the short term, the courts should recognize that hundreds of thousands of people have based their life planning on past policies, and they aren't responsible for the government's past negligence or current savagery. For everyone currently on TPS, this Administration should be required to follow the policies that were in place when they took office. Any changes that they want to make should only apply prospectively to new grants of TPS.
And when this nightmare finally ends, fixing TPS should be one more high-priority item for the first post-Trump Congress to fix.
There should be more, and more straightforward, pathways to citizenship, for people who simply are very eager to be hard-working Americans!
South Florida, Palm Beach County in particular is and always has been a primarily service based place to live. The Haitian community does in fact fill almost all of our health care worker positions and they are excellent at what they do. With the ever growing number of elderly here and even those who aren't, they fill a need no one else will do. As Esther pointed out, they mow our lawns, pick our vegetables, work in food service.. you get my point. This county has an extremely wealthy population that also depends on the immigrant community. This nonsense with him peeves the beans out of me. Thanks for putting this front and center. I hope you continue to do so, because it's a huge issue that will have a horrific impact not just here but across the country. Thanks.
Who did Esther vote for in the last three elections?
Maybe people in Florida should have voted for Clinton or Harris. I feel for the Haitian immigrants because they had no so, but the rest of Florida, in the words of their dominant party, fafo
As an RN. My entire life’s work. iCU and then OR Trauma we never chose one patient over another it was the SEVERITY OF WHO WAS HURT THE WORST AND WHO WAS IN MOST DANGEROUS IF WE DELAYED CARE.
EVERY HRALTH PERSON ON MY LEVEL KNOWS THAT EVERY INDIVIDUAL HAS A RIGHT TO HRALTH CARE.
I would stand before congress myself and tell the world story after story those sitting above us need to understand .
Good lord this is not difficult thinking.
I do advocate zero HRALTH care for all of congress and anyone in cabinent positions. They need to live like the rest of us to understand
Thanks for this article Jonathan. I hope MANY people read (and watch) it! (and we need little Cindy Lou to ask the orange Grinch Why Mr. Grinch Why? and make his heart grow and grow - or maybe easier the Grinchy/Trumpy Senators)
This may be naive, not the first time for me. However it seems this is the lynch pin the Supremes have to rule on:
"TPS comes from a 1990 immigration overhaul that passed with strong bipartisan support and was signed into law by George H.W. Bush. The TPS provisions in effect codified what had already been a common practice, carried out previously on executive authority alone. It allowed foreign nationals to remain in the United States if armed conflict, natural disaster, or other “extraordinary and temporary conditions” made it unsafe for them to return."
If they decide the last sentence no longer applies, which I think is the Feds argument. It comes down to intepretation of these words based on current conditions in Haiti (in this case). Not sure that is a case law issue, which is, at least to me, not a good sign
Thank you for bringing this out, great reporting.
Thank you, Jonathan. I'm just speechless at the cruelty and harm this would inflict on everyone, from the care givers and their families to the patients and the families who absolutely rely on them.
Gee … Rick Scott of Florida. The guy who ripped off Medicare for $1.7B? Hope no one is counting on him to stick up for elder care. https://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/article288431251.html
And everything hinges on Congress. They have the power to stop this administration, still do nothing.