SCOTT SIMON, host:
The Obama administration announced last night that at least 100,000 Haitian immigrants who are in the United States illegally will be allowed to stay for the next year and a half. This means that none will be reported forgive me -deported to their devastated homeland for now. But any Haitians who attempt to flee to the U.S. will be sent back.
NPR's David Welna has the story.
DAVID WELNA: Homeland Secretary Janet Napolitano told reporters in a conference call last night that all Haitians in the U.S. who were facing deportation before the earthquake struck Haiti are being given legal status for the time being. Just like nationals from other nations struck by catastrophe have in the past, these Haitians will be allowed to register for what's known as temporary protected status, or TPS. Napolitano called it a sort of time out for a large number of Haitians who might otherwise be deported.
Secretary JANET NAPOLITANO (Homeland Security Department): I've seen estimates of between one to 200,000 Haitian nationals currently in the country who do not have, or who are not legally in the United States. TPS gives them sort of an intermediate immigration status. It allows them only for a period of 18 months - while Haiti gets back on its feet - to remain in the United States, and authorizes them to work during that period.
WELNA: Napolitano noted that letting these Haitians work legally will allow them to send remittances to needy relatives in Haiti. The Bush administration had refused to grant TPS to Haitians in the U.S. even after floods devastated Haiti six years ago, and four hurricanes hit that nation in 2008.
Mark Krikorian heads the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates more restrictions on immigration. He concedes the earthquake in Haiti is precisely what TPS was designed to deal with.
Mr. MARK KRIKORIAN (Center for Immigration Studies): But the question is: Is it going to be temporary? Because all previous grants of TPS, in actual fact, ended up being permanent. Very few people, if any, have ever been deported after a grant of TPS.
WELNA: Krikorian worries that granting protected status to Haitians in the U.S. will trigger a refugee exodus from Haiti. But Secretary Napolitano stated emphatically last night that those Haitians who attempt to sneak into the U.S. will be sent home.
Secretary NAPOLITANO: At this moment of tragedy in Haiti, it is tempting for people suffering in the aftermath of the earthquake to seek refuge elsewhere. But attempting to leave Haiti now will only bring more hardship to the Haitian people and nation.
WELNA: Napolitano said there have been no signs yet of Haitians fleeing to the U.S. Massachusetts House Democrat Jim McGovern says sending such refugees back would be difficult.
Representative JIM MCGOVERN (Democrat, Massachusetts): The way you prevent that is, you respond the way we're responding right now, in dealing with the humanitarian crisis immediately. That's the way you avoid boatloads of refugees leaving Haiti and coming to the United States.
WELNA: McGovern is among the Democrats and Republicans who pushed hard for Haitians in the U.S. to be given temporary protected status.
David Welna, NPR News, the Capitol.