An immigrant from Miami is joining a federal lawsuit challenging the Trump administration鈥檚 decision to end temporary legal residency for immigrants from Nicaragua, Honduras and other countries, a union announced Thursday.
Maria Elena Hernandez is among seven people asking a federal judge to stop the Trump administration from ending the Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, program, said the Local 32BJ Service Employees International Union.
The Trump administration on Monday cancelled TPS for 72,000 Hondurans and 4,000 Nicaraguans. Many of those are based in South Florida. The TPS designation shields them from deportation.
Earlier this week, the National TPS Alliance sued the Trump administration for ending TPS, arguing that the decisions 鈥渨ere motivated by racial animus鈥� and 鈥渄isregard鈥� to the actual conditions of their home countries. The suit was filed in federal court in San Francisco.
READ MORE: Hondurans, Nicaraguans are latest to lose TPS deportation protections under Trump crackdown
In a statement, Hernandez, who is from Nicaragua and a Local 32BJ SEIU member, said she has 鈥済ood reason to fear鈥� being returned to her native country because of the authoritarian regime in power.
Nicaragua鈥檚 government, led by President Daniel Ortega and his wife and co-President, Rosario Murillo, has been cracking down on dissent since , claiming they were backed by foreign powers that sought his overthrow. The government has now through 鈥渟evere human rights violations,鈥� a panel of United Nations experts warned this year.
Hernandez said she has worked in the same job as a custodian and lived in the same apartment for decades in the U.S.
鈥淚 always believed that the government of the United States would honor all my contributions,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 have paid all my taxes, obeyed all the laws. Why is the government trying to get rid of so many people who have contributed so much to this country?鈥�
Helene O鈥橞rien, Vice President of 32BJ SEIU, said deporting people like Maria Elena, along with tens of thousands of other TPS holders, will force families to be separated and hurt the economy.
鈥淩ipping long-time TPS holders from their jobs and communities won鈥檛 create a single new opportunity for anyone,鈥� O鈥橞rien said in a statement. 鈥淚t will yank skilled, tax-paying workers out of classrooms, airports, hospitals, and hotels, drain billions from local economies, and tear families apart.鈥�
鈥淚nstead of deporting people who have spent decades keeping our cities running and our businesses open, we should honor their contributions and give them the stability every hardworking American deserves,鈥� she added.
Immigrants from Nicaragua and Honduras were first granted TPS in 1998 after Hurricane Mitch destroyed their Central American countries. TPS has been regularly renewed, every 18 months, as political and gang violence has continued to plague both countries.
Administration officials, however, insist it鈥檚 safe for both groups to return home and it鈥檚 revoking their TPS, which just expired last weekend, making them deportable in 60 days.
ending TPS for Nicaraguans, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said this week that their stay in the U.S. "was never meant to last 25 years." She made similar remarks about ending TPS for Hondurans .
TPS does not provide a path to citizenship and must be renewed regularly. Similar terminations have affected other nationalities, including Haitians and Venezuelans.
Terminating TPS is part of President Donald Trump鈥檚 aggressive campaign to end former President Biden-era immigration programs 鈥� TPS and humanitarian parole 鈥� that has allowed hundreds of thousands of immigrants to remain in the country.
