JUDY WOODRUFF: President Trump
has made another consequential
decision regarding immigrants

in this country.

The administration
announced that it is
ending a program that gave
temporary status to hundreds

of thousands of people
from El Salvador.

As Lisa Desjardins explains,
their protected status
will end by September 2019.

LISA DESJARDINS: The U.S. gave
Salvadorans this status to help
after devastating earthquakes

hit in 2001.

They are the latest
group to face possible
deportation in the future.

The Trump administration has
so far announced it would also
end this temporary status for

migrants from Honduras,
Nicaragua and Haiti.

In total, that would
affect nearly 400,000
people in the U.S.

The largest group is over
250,000 from El Salvador.

For more, I'm joined by
Dara Lind, who covers
immigration for Vox.

Thanks for joining us.

DARA LIND, Vox: Thanks
for having me, Lisa.

LISA DESJARDINS: Let's
just start with what
the Trump administration
says they're doing.

Why are they doing this now?

DARA LIND: So, the
administration has taken
the attitude that, as
long as the initial

disaster for which they gave
TPS to somebody - - so, in
this case, the earthquake in El

Salvador in 2001 -- as long
as the country has recovered
sufficiently from that, they

don't see any reason to
continue granting protections
for people to be able to stay

and work in the U.S.

So, they have analyzed the
economy of El Salvador,
have decided that it
has recovered from the

2001 earthquake, and not paid
attention to the considerations
that previous administrations

had of how long people have
been in the U.S., the fact that
at this point they have put

down roots, that many of them
now have U.S. citizen children,
that had previously prevented

other presidents from stripping
legal status from people.

LISA DESJARDINS: So, you said
TPS, temporary protected status.

It's interesting they
are removing this status
now for El Salvadorans.

And it's a country that the
State Department under President
Trump last year warned Americans

not to travel to, citing
one of the highest homicide
rates in the world.

How does the administration
square those two things, telling
Americans, don't go there,

but saying this one group of
people need to return there?

DARA LIND: It's interesting
that they didn't, really.

On today's press call, senior
administration officials were
asked about in particular MS-13,

which has been a major
rhetorical target of
this administration and
which really has its

home base in El Salvador.

And they made it clear that
they didn't see the danger as
being sufficient to prevent

people from going back.

Of course, the irony is that
they're also bragging about
deporting MS-13 gang members

back to El Salvador.

And on today's press call, they
said that the repatriation of
deportees back to El Salvador

is evidence that the
country is doing well.

So, they're kind of engaging
in this double standard, but
they're not trying to square

that circle.

LISA DESJARDINS: It's look
like they're looking at
the letter of the law.

They're saying this is a
temporary status, and we're
saying the time is up now.

But you implied how is
that different from what
other presidents have done?

Other presidents have not
seen it as temporary, even
though it's called temporary?

DARA LIND: So, the reason the
temporary protected status has
been such a problem for previous

administrations is there isn't
a way to get a green card or
get permanent residency in

the U.S. from having
temporary status.

So the choice has been, do
you strip legal status from
people who have been working in

the U.S. for years, or do
you continue to punt the ball
down the road, arguing that

recovery is taking a while
or other things have changed?

Previous administrations
have taken the second option.

The Trump administration
is taking the first option,
as you said, taking this
very letter-of-the-law

approach, without making
any considerations for,
say, the almost 200,000
U.S.-born children,

for the kind of communities
that have grown up.

This is 16 percent of all El
Salvadorans in the U.S. that
they are now saying, well, the

initial reason for us giving
you status has ended, so
we're taking that away.

LISA DESJARDINS: Let's talk
about what happens to them now.

What exactly are their options?

I don't know their advocates
say they have children here.

Many of them have
mortgages here.

What are their
options at this point?

DARA LIND: So, the
administration gave 18
months more that they
can apply for one last

work permit to figure out
what their options are.

At that point, if they have
spouses who are legal residents
or U.S. citizens or if they

children who are above the age
of 21, they have people who
will be able to petition for

them to get green cards.

Other than that, it's going to
be a question of whether they
can find some other way to

potentially get
status into the U.S.

(CROSSTALK)

LISA DESJARDINS: But that's
the minority, probably, right?

DARA LIND: It's very difficult
for somebody to go from being
unauthorized -- or to go

from not having an
obvious pathway to being
able to stay in the U.S.

And so the choice facing most
of them is really whether they
go into the shadows and become

unauthorized immigrants,
or whether they go
back to El Salvador.

It's not like they
are forced to go back.

The Trump administration
probably is not going
to deport all 200,000
people -- or 250,000

people, rather, the day after
their work permits expire.

But the choice of going and
becoming an unauthorized
immigrant certainly
doesn't come without its

risks.

LISA DESJARDINS: And one
last question, quickly.

How are the countries
involved reacting to this?

Is this changing how
they see the U.S., or no?

DARA LIND: The relationship
between the Trump administration
and a lot of Latin American

countries has been a little bit
fraught, not least because of
the way that the administration

describes the MS-13 gang problem
and appears to be implicating
the Salvadoran government

in not doing enough
to help with it.

But the administration hasn't
really had its immigration
policy guided by that, right?

It's considered the
America-first ideology
to be the center of it.

And it's kind of managed
its relationships with
other countries around that.

LISA DESJARDINS: Dara Lind of
Vox, thank you for joining us.

DARA LIND: Thank you.