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Haitian pregnant woman in Florida fears deportation as TPS ends

▶ Watch Video: Pregnant woman in hiding as White House ends deportation protections for Haitian migrants

In Florida, a 29-year-old expectant mother is in hiding, concerned that she will be deported at any moment.   

She is among the more than 300,000 Haitian nationals who held Temporary Protective Status until the Trump administration ended the decades-long program earlier this week after a prolonged legal fight, citing improved conditions in Haiti.

Just ahead of the expiration of TPS, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement made plans to ramp up operations to arrest and deport Haitian migrants, according to two ICE sources and federal documents obtained by CBS News last week.

“I was 6 years old when I first came here,” said the woman, whom CBS News is not naming. She also said that she has no family left in Haiti.

The program was designed for Haitians who came to the U.S. to escape violence in their homeland. 

The TPS program for Haitians has been shuttered despite the State Department having issued a Level 4 travel advisory warning Americans not to travel to the Caribbean nation. A new United Nations report found that there were 613 gang-related killings in Haiti between March and July, and a suspension of basic services in neighborhoods impacted by the violence.

Florida has some of the largest Haitian communities in the U.S.

Little Haiti
A man sits by a mural at the Little Haiti Cultural Center in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami, Florida, on July 30, 2026. 

CHANDAN KHANNA /AFP via Getty Images

“I wouldn’t have anywhere to go,” the woman responded when asked where she would live if deported to Haiti.

She argues that even though the TPS program has “temporary” in its name, “anyone who’s come to this country to pursue a legal status has to have gone through a temporary process.”    

The woman told CBS News she lost her job because her TPS expired, and now her health insurance is due to run out. Her pregnancy is high-risk and requires weekly appointments. She doesn’t know how she’ll afford them.

Her partner is a U.S. citizen, so the baby will be an American wherever she gives birth. 

“Yes, I do feel like I’m American,” she said. “I’ve been in this country most of my life. This is the home that I know.”

For now, she’s hunkering down like so many others. Miami’s Little Haiti appears deserted. Once bustling streets are now empty.

She only risks going outside for necessary doctor’s appointments, something she says she may soon stop doing.

Trump has squandered Republicans’ typical advantages in 2 key areas

By CNN
(CNN) — President Donald Trump’s political stature is so poor right now that he has squandered the Republican Party’s advantage on two major issues that almost always favor the GOP: the economy and national security.A Reuters-Ipsos poll this week showed Democrats and Republicans virtually tied on “war, foreign conflicts and terrorism.” The GOP led on that issue by 11 points after the 2024 election. Today, 37% of US adults say Democrats have a better approach, compared to 36% who say the GOP does.Fox News polling a couple weeks back showed something very similar: On national security, 50% of registered voters preferred the GOP, to 48% who preferred the Democratic Party. That’s compared to a 12-point edge for Republicans in January, before the Iran war.Both recent findings are within the margin of error. But the numbers even being that close is basically unheard of.Fox polling has regularly tested how registered voters compare the two parties on terrorism and national security. Until the Iran war, Democrats had never even been within double-digits of the Republican Party on either issue.Republicans have also led consistently on national security in Gallup polling. Democrats only nosed ahead on that issue once in the 21st century: in 2007.Gallup’s data on which party is better on “international terrorism and military threats” has been even more lopsided in the GOP’s favor.Across 22 polls conducted since a year after 9/11, Democrats have led on that issue only once — again, in 2007 — and most of the time Republicans led by double-digits.And then there’s the economy.The most recent Fox survey showed Democrats leading on that issue by nine points, 54%-45%. That was the biggest Democratic advantage since 2006, when they led by 20 points.And when they took a lead on the economy back in April, it marked the first time they were ahead since 2010, shortly after the 2008 financial crisis that began during the George W. Bush administration.CNN polling back in May showed a closer split between the two parties on the economy, with 35% of adults preferring Democrats, compared to 33% who preferred the GOP.The poll previously asked people to choose between congressional Republicans and congressional Democrats. The last time Republicans didn’t lead on that question was 2009.The numbers on both fronts seem to illustrate that Trump greatly miscalculated the fallout from launching the Iran war — as well as other controversial policies like his global tariffs.By launching the tariffs, he effectively took ownership of whatever became of the economic picture. Then he compounded negative public sentiment by basically shrugging off any responsibility to address Americans’ inflation concerns. Now he’s contending with a still-stagnant economic picture, with the economy shedding 23,000 jobs in July.Americans don’t love Democrats; in fact, the blue side remains pretty unpopular in polls. So the fact that they’ve apparently taken a lead on the economy really says something.And the national security numbers might be even more striking — because Democrats hardly ever even compete with Republicans on the topic.Just as education and health care almost always favor Democrats, national security and defending the homeland are almost always signature GOP issues, and lopsidedly so.That remained true even when Bush launched wars in the Middle East that gradually became pretty unpopular.Trump, though, seems to have botched the Iran war so badly that Americans suddenly see Democrats on equal footing with the GOP — in terms of issues on the GOP’s own turf.The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
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