Families and healthcare providers across the United States face severe strain after the Trump administration ended Temporary Protected Status for roughly 350,000 Haitians, forcing thousands of caregivers and nursing assistants to lose their work authorizations and leave their jobs in July 2025.
About 21,000 Haitian Temporary Protected Status (TPS) holders worked across the United States as caregivers and nursing assistants, serving approximately 77,000 patients according to an analysis of U.S. census data by Philip Connor, a research fellow at Princeton University. The sweeping changes followed a decision by the Trump administration announced in June 2025 to strip TPS protections from Haitians, a policy that survived a protracted legal challenge reaching the Supreme Court as reported by the BBC. America’s top judges ruled in favor of the administration, paving the way for about 350,000 Haitians to lose their legal status at the end of July.
Impact on Long Island Families and Nonprofits
In Rockland County, north of New York City, Richie Rosen, a 43-year-old man born with Williams syndrome who struggles in social settings, lost his longtime caregiver named Tassy when nonprofit Jawonio terminated the aide’s contract on July 27. Jawonio was forced to lay off nearly two dozen Haitian staff members last month, amounting to 7% of its total workforce. Most of those affected provided round-the-clock care for disabled individuals for about $20 per hour.
Rios-Castro noted that the staffing cuts went beyond immigration policy. This has never been just an immigration issue,
she wrote in response to emailed questions, calling it a critical healthcare workforce challenge. Similarly, Linda Mancuso on Long Island watched in distress as her son Michael’s caregiver, Jean, was laid off from a nonprofit supporting individuals with developmental and intellectual disabilities. Jean, who possessed a temporary work permit, lost his position at the end of July along with 18 other Haitian colleagues. Mancuso described Jean as an essential provider who handled hands-on daily care like showering, eating, and sleeping.
State Appeals and Industry Warnings Over Staffing Shortages
The sudden loss of personnel amplified existing vulnerabilities across the domestic care economy. Kezia Scales, vice-president of policy and research at the Paraprofessional Healthcare Institute, noted that Haiti ranks among the top five countries supplying immigrants to the direct-care workforce. We simply do not have enough people in our domestic market, when you exclude immigrants, to fill those jobs,
Scales stated.
State officials and industry leaders moved quickly to push back against the dismissals. Florida appealed directly to the Department of Homeland Security for exemptions, with Emmett Reed, CEO of the Florida Health Care Association, writing a letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin. Reed warned that the loss of Haitian workers risked overwhelming local hospitals and the wider healthcare system in a state with a rapidly expanding older adult population. Meanwhile, Nancy Hagans, president of the New York State Nurses Association, drew parallels to pandemic-era deficits during an August 5 vigil outside Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn. When healthcare workers live in fear of going to work, patient care suffers,
Hagans told the crowd.
Federal Justifications and Future Options for Affected Workers
The Department of Homeland Security defended the administration’s stance on the humanitarian program, which was originally established following the 2010 earthquake in Haiti. In statements to news organizations, a DHS spokesperson emphasized that Temporary Protected Status is meant to be temporary. The agency added that the assertion that the healthcare industry relies on immigrants is false and argued that TPS had functioned for too long as a de facto amnesty program.
With their legal work authorization revoked, former TPS holders face difficult decisions. They can return voluntarily to Haiti—a nation experiencing severe instability, ongoing gang violence, millions of displaced residents, and an absence of elections since 2016—or attempt to remain in the United States while facing the risk of arrest and deportation.
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