Rep. Bryant Bailey Responds to U.S. Supreme Court Decision Threatening Haitian Families and Communities

COLUMBUS - State Rep. Ashley Bryant Bailey (D-Cincinnati) today issued the following statement in response to the Supreme Court's decision giving the Trump Administration complete power to strip Haitian and Syrian immigrants of Temporary Protected Status (TPS).

"Yesterday's Supreme Court decision is an absolute moral failure. By a 6-3 vote, the Court handed the Trump administration complete power to strip Haitian and Syrian immigrants of the protections that have allowed them to live and work here legally, with virtually no ability for intervention. More than 10,000 of those individuals are here in Ohio.

Let's be honest about what drove this decision. The Court's own dissenters noted that the President's statements justifying this policy were so racially charged that the majority refused to put them in print. Call that what it is.

The State Department still warns Americans not to travel to Haiti. Nothing changed on the ground. What has changed is that this administration decided Black immigrants were expendable.

Governor DeWine called this ruling a mistake, and he is right. But these families, some American-born, need more than statements; they need Congress to act. TPS was created through bipartisan legislation. It can be restored the same way.

You don't build a stronger America by deporting the people who are building it. To our Haitian community, here in Ohio and beyond: I see you. I stand with you. And I will always fight for you."