Members of Minnesota’s Haitian community were filled with anxiety and uncertainty as the Supreme Court considered the White House’s move to end a program that had granted thousands from the Caribbean nation the ability to legally work in the United States amidst persistent instability back home.
When the Trump administration moved to end protections last summer, many in the community saw the writing on the wall and began making plans to leave the country.
“They’re stressed out. They’re very concerned for their safety. Many have been working on getting their paperwork processed,” Rose Mingo-Holtz, a Haitian immigrant who runs the Mes Amis French immersion preschool in Minnetonka, told Sahan Journal this week.
On June 25, The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in favor of President Donald Trump’s decision to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitians and Syrians in a decision that also paves the way for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to end the program which in 2025 granted protection to roughly 1.3 million immigrants from 17 countries.
The ruling will end TPS for Haitians and Syrians by the end of July, but no final date has been set. An estimated 4,000 Haitians live in Minnesota; it’s unclear how many are here under TPS.
“It’s a big stress right now within the community. And it’s really sad,” Mingo-Holtz said.
Mingo-Holtz sits on the board of Vanse, a nonprofit organization that supports the local Haitian community, and said the group is fielding questions from people living all over the state who are trying to assess their options and get affairs in order.
Former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced the end of TPS for Haitians in June 2025. Federal judges postponed the end of the program for about 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians, prompting the government to appeal the case to the Supreme Court.
Since Trump returned to the White House in January 2025, Homeland Security has moved to end or not renew the protections, including some that had been in place for more than a decade, for people from 13 countries. The high court previously sided with the administration and allowed the end of the program for people from Venezuela.
Four more countries have TPS designations that are set to expire this year: El Salvador, Lebanon, Sudan and Ukraine, according to NPR.
Some Haitians living in Minnesota have already made the difficult decision to leave the United States. Djenane Saint Juste and her mother Florencia Pierre ran a popular cultural dance group called Afoutayi and called Minnesota home for more than 15 years.
They had TPS since the 2010 earthquake that rocked the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, but opted to leave the country, Mingo-Holtz said, fearing deportation. The family moved to Canada, according to Saint Juste’s website. Their absence has been difficult.
“They really were the glue of the community,” Mingo-Holtz said.
Broader implications
The Supreme Court’s decision goes far beyond enabling the Trump administration to end protections for Haitians and Syrians, according to Ana Pottratz Acosta, an immigration lawyer and professor at the Mitchell Hamline School of Law.
The Trump administration has moved to end TPS for 13 of 17 countries that had protections at the start of 2025. Those terminations have been met with lawsuits that argue DHS hasn’t followed the process established by Congress to properly evaluate conditions in those nations before ending TPS.
The Supreme Court ruling limits both Congressional rule setting and judicial review of that process, according to Pottratz Acosta.
“This really is a pretty significant blow to any future legal challenges for any terminations of TPS,” she said.
Minnesota was home to roughly 8,400 immigrants who had TPS at the start of 2025, according to the National Immigration Forum, a nonprofit organization.
Minnesota has about 1,200 TPS holders from Myanmar, mostly from the Karen ethnic group. In November, DHS announced plans to end temporary protected status for people from Myanmar, which is currently ruled by a military junta. The termination was immediately met with a lawsuit on the grounds that the government hadn’t properly followed the process.
Similar lawsuits are currently open seeking to block the termination of TPS for people from Somalia, South Sudan and Yemen.
People from Haiti or Syria with TPS may have other avenues to stay in the United States legally, Pottratz Acosta said, and should consult with an immigration lawyer as soon as possible.
Seeking stability
People from countries with TPS designations are coming from a very unstable situation, Pottratz Acosta said.
“It’s almost like the rug was pulled out from underneath them, and that is highly traumatizing,” she said.
Haiti was an interesting TPS case because of its frequent extensions, Pottratz Acosta said. She spent time working for Lutheran Social Services in New York and represented many Haitian clients in the wake of the 2010 earthquake. Ongoing unrest led to continued extensions and the Biden administration issued a new designation in 2024 specifically citing political instability and violence in Haiti.
When Noem announced the termination of TPS for Haiti last June, she said conditions in the country had improved. But advocates say that isn’t true and the State Department advises U.S. citizens against traveling to Haiti due to safety concerns.
Mingo-Holtz, an American citizen, hasn’t been back to her home country in 30 years. It’s not that she doesn’t want to go.
“Every time I want to go back, I can’t go because of the insecurity and instability,” she said.
Last week her mother told her about a good friend whose son was briefly kidnapped for ransom. Those stories remain common in the country, where criminal gangs control wide swaths of territory.
“We just want to be able to have a life,” Mingo-Holtz said. “We come here like everybody else, we work, we pay our taxes, we pay our dues.”
