The Florida Roundup - Waiting for America

Episode Date: November 24, 2023

On the Florida Roundup, we look at the impact of President Biden's humanitarian parole for migrants, one year later. Throughout the hour, we explored the WLRN News’ series “Waiting for America” with some of the reporters who contributed to it.

This is the Florida Roundup. I'm Tom Hudson. Happy Thanksgiving and thanks for being along this week. It's been a little more than a year since the Biden administration launched a new effort it hoped would alleviate some of the immigration crisis on the southern border. It's a humanitarian parole program for migrants escaping economic collapse and dictatorships, first from Venezuela and then Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua. It was designed to keep them from making the most dangerous trek across America's overwhelmed southern border, and it's a key component to President Biden's immigration agenda, which is under fire as he seeks re-election. Now today, we're going to focus on this program, how it's supposed to work, and what migrants actually experience. Our partner station in South Florida, WLRN, spent months reporting on the program, finding it has been hampered by bureaucratic problems that undermine its success.

Demand is higher than the Biden administration has anticipated. It's difficult, if not impossible, for some migrants to find sponsors and get passports, key requirements for the program. And work permits here in the United States are still taking months to secure. Tim Padgett gets our story started by looking at the Venezuelan community and how the White House may have underestimated the demand from what has become the fastest growing Hispanic group over the past decade. Hi, how are you? Everywhere she goes these days, seven-year-old Nia is practicing English. On this recent visit to a Starbucks in Doral, Nia is determined to kibitz with a cashier. She's buying a treat her family could rarely find or afford back in Venezuela, chocolate milk. That's it?, Meliana Bruguera, beams down at her while holding Nia's infant

brother, Rurik. The three of them arrived here from Valencia, Venezuela in May after being approved for the Biden administration's new humanitarian parole for migrants. It allows Venezuelans as well as Cubans, Haitians and Nicaraguans, all hoping to escape humanitarian crises and dictatorships, to come to the U.S. for two years if a sponsor here can support them. They can also get work permits. Bruguera is a lawyer and she insists the need for the parole is real. In her words, it's a struggle to stay alive in Venezuela while confronting economic collapse and a brutally authoritarian regime. Bruguera also wanted to avoid the dangerous trip so many Venezuelans make on foot through

the Darien jungle between Colombia and Panama to get to the U.S., especially after seeing the menacing conditions that friends who'd made that journey there sent back on social media. Even so, back in October of 2022, Bruguera and her husband were just about to decide to take their own family through the Darien jungle to the U.S. Then the announcement came that Venezuelans would be the first invited to apply for the Biden parole. It was the start of a project meant to stop

Venezuelans and other migrants from flooding the U.S. southern border, a crisis that keeps bringing down Biden's approval ratings. Bruguera says she still cries thinking about the relief the parole news brought her. I still cry a lot. Bruguera signed up for the parole within weeks of its launch. She secured a sponsor, a friend who lives in Doral, and she hoped to be in the U.S. by Christmas. It didn't happen. In January, the parole program then brought in Cubans, Haitians and Nicaraguans, and it started accepting a total of 30,000 applicants per month.

Bruguera considered herself chronologically way ahead in the line, but her approval didn't come until the end of April. Now she says she's still waiting for her husband, who finally secured a sponsor last spring and applied for the parole on May 4th. The program is the best hope we've had in years, she told me. who finally secured a sponsor last spring and applied for the parole on May 4th. The program is the best hope we've had in years, she told me. But, she said, the waiting hurts. Bruguera's pain as assigned the humanitarian parole program has been so popular,

the Biden administration may have significantly underestimated the demand for it. Just look at the four nationalities that qualify for this humanitarian parole and their country conditions. John De La Vega is a Venezuelan-American immigration attorney in Miami. I knew it. I knew it was going to be millions of applications, and they were now going to be able to adjudicate all this. Almost 270,000 migrants have received the parole as of last month, more than a quarter of them Venezuelan. But De La Vega points out that may only be about 10% of those who've actually applied for it.

And because only half the applications are being processed chronologically, the other half are taken randomly to make it more fair, that leaves many early applicants feeling distressed. So we have Venezuelans since October of 2022. There's people that apply within 48 hours of this program starting, and they have not received an answer. In theory, this parole program is a good solution. The problem is that it's just massive logistics, and I don't think they have the amount of officers to be able to do it. The Department of Homeland Security points out it is meeting its monthly 30,000 applicant approval target,

but it says it needs more resources to expand that goal. A U.S. official told WLRN, quote, our immigration system is outdated and we need Congress to act in modernizing it to ensure we can efficiently support the demand. In the meantime, Venezuelans are returning to the Darien jungle. That's recent AP video of migrants tramping through Central America's Darien jungle en route to the U.S. Authorities say most of the people making that trek right now are Venezuelans. One reason? Impatience, says one Venezuelan woman named Norbelis. woman named Norbelis. Norbelis, she asked us not to use her full name, was also among the first last year to sign up for the U.S. humanitarian parole. But eventually, she told me, it felt like the brakes had been put on my application. So she gave up waiting for an answer. In May, the single

mother left her teenage son behind and set out alone for the U.S. by land through the Darien jungle. She calls her four days in that zone some of the hardest of my life, like confronting death, literally. At one point, Norbelis recalls, she slipped climbing a steep, rain-slick jungle hill and almost fell to her death. She made it to the U.S. southern border this summer and was later led into the country temporarily as an asylum seeker. The former bank accounts manager now cleans hotel rooms in Tampa without a work permit. Norbelis argues thousands of Venezuelans who sought the parole but haven't received a response are doing what she did. The very thing the parole was meant't received a response are doing what she did, the very thing the parole

was meant to discourage. She says they're saying, I can't keep waiting for the miracle of a better life. I have to go out and get the miracle. But the parole program faces another threat here in the U.S. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton suing the Biden administration over the president's new immigration program. Attorneys general for more than 20 Republican-led states have sued to shut down Biden's parole program. They call it an unlawful executive action. A federal judge in Texas is now hearing arguments. John De La Vega, the Miami attorney, believes the judge will rule in Biden's favor. I think it will survive. However, if the government doesn't improve their methods to adjudicate this humanitarian parole,

I don't want this to be another immigration disaster for this administration. Biden administration officials insist the reason they had to create the humanitarian parole program in the first place was that immigration in the U.S. was already a disaster. I'm Tim Padgett in Miami. Tim joins us now here on the Florida Roundup. Tim, we know the stories of challenges that cities like New York, Chicago, Washington, what they've been experiencing with migrants. What about here in Florida? Well, Florida has been seeing an uptick, appreciable uptick, really, in the number of undocumented immigrants it's receiving. Between 2017 and 2021, for example, Florida was one of only two states that did show an increase in its undocumented population. were coming in undocumented, coming over the border first and then coming into Florida undocumented because of the awful situations, political and economic, there in those two countries. So that influx had a lot not only to do with the uptick in undocumented population here

in Florida, but the uptick from those two nationalities also had a lot to do with the Biden administration deciding to create this parole program. Now, Florida and its diaspora is very large and well-developed and established here in Florida, particularly when it comes to Cubans and Venezuelans, but also Nicaraguans and Haitians, the other two countries that are targeted with this humanitarian parole. Does that help explain perhaps why we haven't seen the kind of pictures here in Florida that we've seen with the migrant populations in New York and Washington and Chicago? Right, because we have so much more of a, let's say, a family infrastructure established here in Florida that can absorb the Nicaraguan, Cuban, Venezuelan,

and Haitian undocumented migrants. If those migrants are going to a place like Chicago, yeah, you don't have the infrastructure there in place to receive them. So how is the diaspora population of those countries here in Florida? How has it been responding to the humanitarian parole program? It's been a remarkably popular program, especially here in Florida. So much so that I think the Biden administration has been realizing, as we point out in our reports, that it may have significantly underestimated the demand for this parole. Now, to its credit, the Biden administration is meeting the 30,000 per month goal of the number of migrants it wants to receive into this parole program. But the catch is that may only be about a tenth of those who have actually applied for it,

as we point out in the report. I think we're nearing about 300,000 migrants now who have been accepted for the parole. But you're looking at perhaps much more than two million people who have actually applied for it. Yeah, enormous demand for this parole program. Florida is one of 21 states that have sued to stop this humanitarian parole program. What's the status of the lawsuit? Well, we're still waiting for a federal judge in Texas to make a ruling on it. He's heard both sides for the administration and the attorneys general from these 21 states. So we're still waiting for that judge to make a ruling in Texas on whether this program can continue or if he decides it was,

as the attorneys general from these states are arguing, that it was an unlawful executive action on immigration on the part of the Biden administration. So how has the United States used this idea of humanitarian parole previously with migrants? Well, mostly you would have seen it done for, you know, war crisis situations like Ukraine. In fact, this parole program for Cubans, Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, and Haitians was sort of modeled after the parole program that was developed for Ukrainian refugees. So we have seen it used in the past, But, you know, as I said, usually for like war or natural disaster situations. But what I think the Biden administration and the U.S. in general is seeing is sort of a new kind of crisis that's demanding this kind of program. You can say that Venezuela is not at war, but it's experiencing an out exodus of refugees that's equal to what we're seeing in Ukraine and war-torn places like Syria. Yeah, it's an economic crisis and some would argue political crisis with these four countries,

but not a military action necessarily. Venezuela is experiencing the worst humanitarian crisis in modern South American history, and it's lost a fifth of its population because of it. So this strategy was put in place to address the building and continuing crisis on the southern border of the United States and Mexico. Has it had any material impact on border crossings? Yes and no, up and down. Originally, yes, you did see a decline in the number of illegal crossings on the border. And a lot of it had to do with this parole program because so many of the illegal crossings these days at the southern border of the United States has to do with the Venezuelans, Cubans, Nicaraguans, etc. But let's say, for example, from May to July, we did see a 40 percent decrease in the number of encounters that U.S. officials were having with illegal crossings, undocumented migrants, etc.

But that started going up during the summer. And a lot of it had to do with the fact, again, with the Venezuelans, the fact that Venezuelans who were waiting, felt that they were waiting too long to get their applications for the parole accepted, just gave up and said, nope, I'm going to go through Central America, through the Darien jungle, and I'm going to go over the U.S. southern border. So then in July, August, September, we started seeing the number of illegal crossings at the border going up again. Well, the Biden administration then in October started executing deportation flights for Venezuelans who were coming over illegally. deportation flights for Venezuelans who were coming over illegally, that's when we saw the number of crossings go down by 14%. What I'm saying here is a lot of this has to do with the Venezuelans and their desperation. They are now the largest nationality arriving at the U.S. southern border. Tim Padgett is the America's editor at our partner station WLRN in Miami.

Thanks, Tim. Thank you, Tom. Now, the chance to work legally in the United States for two years was a key component of the humanitarian parole program the Biden administration launched about a year ago. But despite the promise of work permits, some new arrivals from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela have been left unable to legally work in America for months, causing stress and financial pressure for them and the people who agree to sponsor them. Reporter Danny Rivero discovered that not all nationalities have this problem, though. Tens of thousands of Afghans have been paroled into the U.S. since the government collapsed two years ago and the U.S. military chaotically pulled out.

And since the Russian invasion, more than 100,000 Ukrainians have come to the U.S. under a parole program modeled after the one for Afghans. What's notable about both these programs is that the new arrivals are automatically allowed to work for at least three months as soon as they arrive. They can start working and they can work for 90 days while they wait for that work employment authorization card. Cecilia Esterlin is an immigration research analyst at the Niskaysin Center, a nonpartisan think tank in D.C.

She says the parole program for Ukrainians and Afghans is working smoothly. But this success has not transferred to a newer parole program rolled out last October. The one that's let nearly 250,000 people into the country over the last year. First from Venezuela, and later from Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua. When one of those nationals gets here, they cannot automatically work. Instead, they first have to apply for a work permit. Federal data shows it takes on average about four months to approve those permits. Esterlin says this needs to change. So that at least they can start working and hopefully they can join the workforce more quickly. They can help us with the labor shortages that we have and in general just relieve some of

the pressure that these families and their sponsors are experiencing. The Department of Homeland Security tells WLRN the difference between the groups is that specific laws were passed, making it easier for Ukrainians and Afghans to quickly get to work. The parole program and other actions taken by the Biden administration are executive actions based on interpretations of existing laws. That's why many states, including Florida, are fighting the parole program and federal court. The federal backlog of pending work authorizations has exploded. According to federal data, more than 400,000 new arrivals in the U.S. have been waiting over six months to get work permits. The Biden administration says it's working to speed up the process. Democrats and Republicans have asked me for help

placing these migrants into jobs, jobs that have gone unfilled for too long. In New York State, the backlog has become a top priority for Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul. The state is seeing thousands of migrants, including people who applied for asylum and likely many from the parole program. She pressed the White House to fast-track the work permits.

For me, the answer to these two crises, this humanitarian crisis and our workforce crisis, is so crystal clear and common sense. Let them get the work authorizations. Let them work legally. Let them work. In response, the Biden administration recently expanded temporary protected status for nearly half a million Venezuelans who entered the U.S. before July 31st.

That move might help many Venezuelans get work permits, but it won't have much impact on those who came under the parole program. In Orlando, Samuel Vilches Santiago is sponsoring his aunt and cousin from Venezuela, and his parents are sponsoring two other cousins through the program. When we talked on Zoom back in August, work permits for his cousins had just arrived in the mail. They don't know yet.

I have to call them. I was going to surprise them later today. Vilches Santiago works with the American Business Immigration Coalition, a pro-immigrant advocacy group. He says there are tons of job openings in Florida, and people like his aunt and cousins are ready and just waiting to fill them. And these are jobs that might not be the best paying, but some of them are making $15, $20 an hour in key industries like construction, hospitality, and retail. I heard from him later. Both his cousins got jobs working at a concert venue in Orlando. I'm Danny Rivero in Miami. I'm Tom Hudson. You can always stay up to date with us by emailing radio at thefloridaroundup.org, radio at thefloridaroundup.org. Be sure to catch

this program and all of our past programs by subscribing to our podcast. Find it at your favorite podcast site. Coming up, how volunteers are helping Nicaraguans apply for humanitarian parole. And you're listening to The Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio Station. This is the Florida Roundup. I'm Tom Hudson. Next week on our program, California and Florida. The two governors face off on a Fox News debate next week. Immigration, education, jobs, the environment. How do these two states compare? And what are the stakes for the two governors? Most importantly, what are the stakes for you? Email us your thoughts. Radio at thefloridaroundup.org. Radio at thefloridaroundup.org. The Sunshine State or the Golden State?

Politics and Personalities. It's next week. Email us today. Radio at thefloridaroundup.org. This week, we're talking about an immigration strategy the Biden administration put in place about a year ago in hopes of easing the pressure of migrants coming to the southern border. It is a humanitarian parole program that was first directed at people coming from Venezuela and then expanded to people from Cuba, Nicaragua, and Haiti. The program grants no more than 30,000 people a month the parole. More than a million and a half have applied, and in order to qualify, people have to pass health and security checks and have

someone in the United States who agrees to be responsible for them. Without the humanitarian parole, someone crossing the border could be deported right away. Families and volunteers help migrants with the process, hoping to be granted the parole. Veronica Zaragoza now reports. Anita Wells is the founder of a group called Abue Nica, Abue for Abuela and Nica for Nicaragua. I'm not a psychologist. I'm just a mom and a grandmother. She sees herself as a grandmother to people who migrate to the U.S. from her home country. She came in 1980, just after the revolution of 1979, when the Sandinista Liberation Front overthrew a dictatorship and started its own authoritarian government. And now she's in

frequent contact with fellow Nicaraguan volunteers whose lives were affected by the political turmoil in Nicaragua over the decades. It is like a big quilt of Nicaraguans who have been living in this country for many years. We have nothing to gain for ourselves. I definitely saw the big quilt that Wells described. Each person I spoke to for this story knew other people spread out around the country who are doing this work. Wells lives in Virginia, just outside D.C. Douglas Rossman is incredible.

She introduced me to Douglas Rossman, who lives in Everglades City on Florida's West Coast. We communicate daily on weekends. I take a couple hours per day, check messages. Is your day like you're constantly getting WhatsApp messages you have to answer? Yes, 24-7. Rossman is in touch with Tamara Garcia in Miami-Dade County. We assist each other.

We do translations of documents for one another, guidance. I met Tamara in 2019. Garcia and Muriel Saenz know each other too. We went to Washington and we founded one of the first organizations called Nicaraguan Human Rights Alliance. Saenz lives in rural South Texas. She moved here 40 years ago. Tamara Garcia came 25 years ago. And Douglas Rossman, just two.

They share a common goal, to help others escape President Daniel Ortega's police state, where citizens get spied on. And anyone who opposes the ruling Sandinista party can face imprisonment, torture, and death. In January, Nicaraguans became eligible to apply for humanitarian parole in the U.S. I want to see my country free. Before I die, all I want is democracy in Nicaragua. Anita Wells, who founded the nonprofit Abuenica, helps people apply for asylum and, since January, also for the parole program. My name is Douglas Rossman. I'm a volunteer with Agua Nica.

As volunteers, you know, we have a lot of people that we have to help. We walk with them until they're ready to run. To do that, Rossman goes long distances himself. He lives in Everglades City and regularly drives the two hours across the Florida Peninsula to Miami. I recently tagged along for a bit as Rossman drove fellow Nicaraguans to appointments like at the Miami immigration court or at an attorney's office. Tedious errands,

but they get excited about lunch at Pino Landia, a Nicaraguan restaurant in Miami. Doña Cecilia, ¿usted va a comer algo? Claro que sí. ¿Indio viejo? Indio viejo. ¿Un vaho? ¿Le gusta el vaho? Un vaho con cacao. ¿Qué es que gusta hacer de allá? Qué rico. ¿Cuándo fue la última vez que comió un vaho? Indio viejo. Indio viejo. Un bao. You like the bao? Yes.

A bao with cacao. You like it from there? It's delicious. When was the last time you ate a bao? Rosman asks if one woman will order indio viejo, a Nicaraguan beef stew, or bao, a mix of meat, green plantains, and yuca cooked in banana leaves. When he's helping from home, Rossman also makes video tutorials. In this screen recording, he's explaining how to apply for a work permit under the parole program.

Home has become the office for these volunteers. Tamara Garcia works from her kitchen table in Doral. On the bottom right corner of her laptop, she has a sticker that reads Nicaragua Libre, or Free Nicaragua. Nicaragua has reached 10% of the population since 2018. Sorry. Let's see. Maurin. While we're talking, she takes an important call for an asylum seeker in Atlanta. Okay. Get her the asylum application. important call for an asylum seeker in Atlanta.

She also tries to find people willing to give parolees a temporary place to stay while they get settled. I'm Veronica Saragovia in Miami. More than 200,000 people have been granted humanitarian parole under the program the White House instituted about a year ago. That's far less than the well over one million people applying. Daniel Rivero returns now bringing us the story of how a Cuban political dissident has been reunited with his family and is building a new life in Florida. It's time for the daily English lesson in the Pacheco Ruiz household in

Brownsville. Three teenagers and one preteen gather around their dining room table to watch YouTube on a phone. Fourteen-year-old Samadhi came to the U.S. two years ago from Cuba with her mother and one brother. And she's the one who leads the classes. So far, she's picked up the most English, so spreading the knowledge is her duty as she continues to adjust to her new life. I don't know what to expect, like in the future, maybe I don't know what I will do tomorrow, like,

in the future and all those things. When I spent time with the family in late September, Samadhi's father and three of her siblings had been in the U.S. for just a few weeks. They came under a humanitarian parole program created by the Biden administration. I need a job. I need a job.

Amaury Pacheco is under no illusions. He's 54 and is starting a new life in a new country. Alongside his children, he practices English on Duolingo every day to get ready for an eventual job. My friend. Friend, yes. My friend. It's easy.

Pacheco is Afro-Cuban and a poet. And for decades, he's been at the forefront of Cuba's independent art scene. Most recently, he was one of the founders of the Movimiento San Isidro, a collective of artists that helped spark the unprecedented nationwide protests on July 11th, 2021. Pacheco remembers he was detained by police that day

before he was even able to hit the streets. And from inside the police station, he saw rounds of protesters getting dropped off. Protesters who told him about the rebellion outside. In the aftermath of the protests, many of Pacheco's closest friends, like fellow artist Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, are locked up in prison under charges of threatening the communist government. So many people are leaving under the weight of government oppression and economic crisis, he says the country has a feeling of existential emptiness. He says learning how to get settled here is an open question. We arrived at 2 a.m. at the airport here in Miami, and at 9 a.m. they were already hospitalizing me.

His wife, Iris Ruiz, has been in the U.S. almost two years now, after she came seeking medical treatment. She says the communist government strategically denied her the treatment she needed for a wide range of conditions. She came on a tourist visa, which has now expired, leaving her and two of her children undocumented. But for now, they've applied for political asylum. When she heard the news that the Biden administration opened up the parole program for Cubans, Ruiz felt relief that her family might be able to reunite.

But it also meant they needed to find someone to sponsor her husband and children to join her in Miami. Like someone gives you an elephant as a gift, but you have to carry it home. In the end, the family did find a sponsor who has paid rent for three months for this house in Brownsville. But after that, the family's expected to be more or less on its own. In the kitchen, Amaury Pacheco is making Cuban coffee.

The real kind. Not the kind mixed with split peas that they sell in Cuba. Pacheco is learning to adjust to the harsh realities of capitalism after a lifetime spent under the harsh realities of the communist system. Immigrating, says Pacheco, sometimes feels like a free fall, like flailing in the air, looking for something to hold on to. But then sometimes it's like that feeling you get when you're going downstairs and then without realizing it, boom, you hit the floor. There's no more falling to do. Finally, you're on solid ground. Daniel Rivero reporting from our partner station WLRN in Miami.

Haiti is one of the four countries from which migrants can file for humanitarian parole under this federal government effort designed to ease migration pressure at the southern border. Haitians are facing long wait times and extortion as they try to obtain passports needed so they can apply for the humanitarian parole. Their loved ones in Florida are victims, too. Here's Wilkin Brutus. Passport? and her loved ones in Florida are victims too. Here's Wilkin Brutus. Pastor? Mm-hmm. In this video from the U.S. Embassy in Haiti, we see Haitian comedian Tonton Bichat walking down a street.

In the skit, he walks into a makeshift office with a handwritten cardboard sign over the door that reads, Little Consul Agency. Tonton Bichat hands his passport to a disheveled man sitting behind a desk. It's a funny PSA meant to warn Haitians against common scams involving passports, visas, and other government-issued documents. This video is seven years old. These scams have been happening in Haiti for a long time, and they're especially bad right now. Tens of thousands of people are seeking passports

so they can apply for the Biden administration humanitarian parole program that was opened up to Haitians in January. They're facing long wait times and extortion from criminals, and their family and loved ones, including here in South Florida, are among the victims. We could have pinpointed some of these risks. Paul Christian-Nomphi is lead organizer for the Family Action Network Movement, or FAM. The Haitian-led organization provides legal and social services for immigrants in

Miami-Dade County. Attorneys and advocates are not surprised that these passport scams are affecting the Biden parole program. And all of a sudden, it became clear to corrupt forces in the Haitian public administration and cronies of theirs that this was a money-making enterprise. And the only effective way to get a passport in a meaningful timeframe was to pay through the nose to what people call a gacketer. You are paying a bribe to someone who has an inside connection, who's going to do something for you on the inside. And what you will see is multiple phases where you have to pay money

and then you have to pay more money. It's almost like it's a kidnapping ransom. Through regular channels, it currently costs about $220. But the racketeers charge a lot more. You know, some people have had to pay north of $1,000 U.S. In his office in Miami, Numphy is on the phone with the sponsor from the parole program, who actually paid someone in Haiti extra money to help expedite a Haitian passport for a relative. He says clients are afraid speaking out will impact their cases.

Numphy said many people, including some of his clients, have been stuck in limbo since January because of racketeers. I have three or four people. They have no one who can muster enough money to get them a passport. There's price gouging. People know about this program. And a lot of people are stuck down there and want to have a passport in order to be eligible. Cassandra Suprin is a Haitian attorney with Americans for Immigrant Justice in Miami. It's a nonprofit law firm which provides legal representation to low-income immigrant families. She says passport delays can split families apart from adoptees unable to leave orphanages

to parents rushing to get passports for their minors after being accepted into the Biden administration humanitarian parole program. A lot of them didn't have a passport for the kid yet. So now they're applying for the passport for the child. Immigration attorneys warn Haitians not to pay racketeers. It's a risky bet that may not pay off. Clarel Cyriac is a Haitian immigration attorney in Miami who has represented asylum seeking clients for the past 30 years.

He acknowledges there are severe backlogs going through the proper channels. People still report significant problems in terms of the length of time it takes to get it. Although the people at the passport agency will tell you that you need to use the official mechanisms and that should be sufficient. Cyriac said he and other Haitian advocates saw this coming, and that they petitioned federal officials for potential solutions early on, such as waiving the passport requirement, allowing expired passports, or accepting an alternative Haitian travel document. The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment.

I'm Wilkin Brutus in Miami. And I'm Tom Hudson. You are listening to the Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio station. Wilkin Brutus joins us now. To put it politely, the Haitian government is in disarray. Even in the best of times, was there an efficient process for Haitians to get passports? And so that sort of lack of infrastructure has certainly made it quite difficult for the process to go seamlessly. And so you're seeing a lot more delays in the actual process to get passports, which are forcing people to take alternative routes. And what's been the impact then on the ability of Haitians to apply for this humanitarian parole

if they have trouble simply getting a legitimate passport? Right. Well, data from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security shows that nearly 100,000 Haitians have been approved for the Biden parole program, which is the highest number admitted out of the four eligible countries, Haiti, Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela. But since many Haitians in Haiti are still struggling to get into the program, tens of thousands of Haitians since the summer are paying thousands of dollars for chartered flights into Nicaragua because the country doesn't have a visa requirement. That's a growing sort of avenue for migrants seeking asylum into the United States.

And so for the Haitians who do get scammed or are taken advantage of because of the difficulty in getting a legitimate passport in a timely manner, do they have any recourse? Haitian immigration attorneys and advocates have told me that if there is recourse in Haiti, it's very limited. The U.S. embassy in Haiti has made public service announcements in the past, in the last few years, to sort of dissuade people from paying racketeers. And Haitian immigration lawyers here in South Florida have certainly urged applicants to go through the regular channels. But the regular passport delays within Haiti have also been just a major source of frustration for Haitians, which is driving Haitians to take alternative routes.

Wilkin Brutus reporting from South Florida. Thanks, Wilkin. Thank you, Tom. Coming up, one family's harrowing journey from their home in Venezuela to Florida. I'm Tom Hudson, and you're listening to The Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio station. This is The Florida Roundup. Thanks again for being along with us this week. I'm Tom Hudson. Venezuelans are now the fastest growing Hispanic group in the country, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Millions of people have fled the political, economic, and humanitarian crisis under the government of President Nicolás Maduro. Kate Payne now brings us the story of one family's journey from their home in Venezuela through the jungles of Central America and finally to South Florida. It's been

almost two years since Huiston left his home in Maracay, Venezuela, and he says he misses everything. Huiston is 13, his curly black hair trimmed into a smooth fade. He's in eighth grade and trying to play it cool in the way that teenagers do, but he's still so young. We're not using his family's full names because of their sensitive immigration status. Weestone says he loved to spend his days in the park by his house in Venezuela, playing soccer with his friends. Here in the United States, I stay here in my house watching movies or studying. These days, Wiston says, he spends a lot of his time inside, watching videos and studying. When I first arrived to this apartment that he and his parents share with a few other families,

he'd just finished working out and doing push-ups. We sat at a little table in the hallway where his mom, Giuliani, does manicures. Huston says the situation in Venezuela left his family no choice. They had to leave. HUSTON, Venezuelan, Venezuelan Family Member, Venezuela Huston and his parents are among the millions of Venezuelans who have left their country behind. And they took the hard way.

In record numbers, Venezuelans are making the dangerous and sometimes deadly trek through Central America to reach the U.S.-Mexico border on foot. Giuliani says the journey took them three months. They hiked through the Darien Gap, a treacherous jungle stretching between Colombia and Panama. It's considered one of the world's most dangerous routes for migrants. It's been called a green hell. Giuliani says all her toenails fell off. Wheatstone's dad, Wheatstone Sr., showed me some videos of them there.

In one, someone they're with is trying to keep their spirits up, saying, it's hard, but we can do it. For a while, the kids traveling with the group handled it well, Giuliani says, treating it like a summer camp. says, treating it like a summer camp. But she couldn't hide the stark realities of this muddy, roadless wilderness. She says she didn't want her family to go through this, especially her son. But she says they had to.

Criminal gangs prey on migrants along the journey. Liston's dad says they saw dead bodies in the jungle and met women who had been raped. It was incredibly difficult. They had no choice but to keep walking. As they made it into Central America, there were houses where migrants could get help, organizations that gave them food as their supplies ran out. But some nights, she says, they slept in the street and under bridges. In Mexico, they slipped onto a freight train known as the Beast.

Winston Sr. and other men rode on top of the car, with women and kids inside. In a video he took, trees whipped by as they rattled across the countryside, praying for a miracle. they rattled across the countryside, praying for a miracle. The family swam across the Rio Grande at 1.30 in the morning, they say, and told border officials they had relatives in South Florida. Once they got to Miami,

Whiston's mom says he saw a therapist for a few months, and he would cry about everything he missed in Venezuela. Huiston says he doesn't think he needs therapy anymore. His mom says he doesn't want to remember. They're grateful for their new home, this apartment above a little bodega on a busy road off of US 1 in Miami. And which one is yours? This one here. off of US 1 in Miami. And which one is yours?

This one here. Ruiz-Ton shares one bedroom with his mom, dad, and older sister, who joined them later. Other families live here as well, 11 people in all, with one kitchen and two bathrooms. They'd like to have their own place one day, but this is the only option they have for now. They say they're just scraping by, going to a church food pantry and leaning on family members.

Giuliani says they're working on applying for temporary protective status, or TPS, which the Biden administration recently expanded for Venezuelans. For about $500 a pop, she and her husband could apply for work permits. It's a welcome solution, but it won't happen overnight. The fee is too high for the young parents who say they can't afford the last three binders their son needs for school. who say they can't afford the last three binders their son needs for school. Seeing Whistone walk the halls of Ponce de Leon Middle School and Coral Gables, you wouldn't necessarily know what he's been through, the things he's seen.

On the day I visited, we got to sit in on Whistone's English for Speakers of Other Languages class. Yes, copy the question. We are working on the question right now, practicing the articles. His teacher, Maritza Victory, says all of the students in this class are newcomers. It's part of the district's effort to carve out a space for these new immigrants to be around other kids with shared experiences. Right now we have these few students, but they are coming every day. There were about 12 kids the day I visited, with plenty of seats for the new students that are expected to keep coming.

Ms. Victory says Weaston's English has improved a lot since he went to a special language camp for newcomers over the summer. Yes, he's more comfortable because he feel more confident. Now he help the other students. He open the binders and write the topic. He tried to translate it. Oh, what a libro. In Spanish I said, no you already know what to do they need to learn too. So you can help them but in English not in Spanish.

Whiston says he's been doing better in school after those sessions he had with a therapist. He's been able to step away from his past and think more about the future. He really wants to work on his English this year. So he'll be ready for high school in the fall and everything that will bring. I'm Kate Payne in Miami. Joshua Ceballos contributed reporting for that story. I'm Tom Hudson. You're listening to The Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio station.

Kate Payne is with us now here on The Florida Roundup. How is Wiston doing these days? So I was checking in with his mom recently, and she says that he's doing good. He's doing about the same. She's still trying to sign him up for a soccer team. He loves to play soccer. And something we heard from this family and other families who were a part of this reporting, in Miami especially, a lot of these kids are kind of cooped up.

If they don't have good access to transportation, aren't able to easily walk to parks, they're spending a lot of time inside. So that could make a difference for him. But she said he still has a long way to go on his English. He's still missing a lot. And any update on the family's status as it tries to achieve the temporary protected status? So she said that in working with some local organizations, she was able to apply for TPS for herself and for her son. So that's huge. They haven't heard back yet, but the application is in. Weaston's dad, because he's Colombian, she said that they weren't able to apply for him.

Even though he was living in Venezuela, they're married, raising their kids there. They don't have the proper paperwork. Giuliani, Wiston's mom, is still trying to find a way to get her daughter out of Venezuela. Now, Miami-Dade schools, like a lot of the larger public school districts in Florida, have long histories of absorbing newly arrived immigrant families and students. Has this year been any different with changes to the humanitarian parole program as well as changes to TPS with various countries? So the numbers I have so far from the district, which are changing every day, honestly. It seems to be a continuation of last year, last school year, when we saw this market increase from around the world, but again, especially from those four countries, Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. And for the Miami-Dade

School District in particular, the overwhelming number are from Cuba. So far this year for Cuba, as of September, about 3,000 new immigrant students from Cuba in the district. Again, you know, the district is trying to really cater those classes of English for speakers of other languages to have these kids together in a newcomer's class where they're having shared experiences of being so new to this country. Create some kind of community here in their new home. And a level of comfort that kids who are on a similar level and sharing those experiences of coming all this way and being in a new place and feeling comfortable making mistakes as you're learning a new language. Well, thanks for bringing this story to us. Much appreciated, Kate. Thank you so much.

Kate Payne, education reporter for our partner station WLRN in Miami. And finally, on the roundup this week, the first Thanksgiving may not have been in Plymouth, Massachusetts, after all, but rather in St. Augustine, Florida. have been in Plymouth, Massachusetts, after all, but rather in St. Augustine, Florida. Yeah, the National Park Service dates the first feast to 1565, when the city was first founded by Spanish settlers. The Park Service says after the group of about 800 came ashore, they set up a meal and invited the local Siloam tribe. Regardless of the first, the last Thursday in November did not become the legal Thanksgiving holiday until 377 years later in 1942. Happy Thanksgiving. That is our program for today.

The stories featured in today's program were edited by WLRN's Director of Enterprise Journalism, Jessica Baikman, and Senior Editor, Sarah Mobley-Smith. The Florida Roundup is produced by WLRN Public Media in Miami and WUSF Public Media in Tampa. Bridget O'Brien produced the program. WLRN's vice president of radio and the program's technical director is Peter Mayers, engineering help from Doug Peterson and Charles Michaels. Our theme music is provided by Miami jazz guitarist Aaron Libos at aaronlibos.com. If you missed any of today's program, you can download

it and listen to past programs at wlrn.org slash podcasts. Thanks for listening and supporting public radio in your community. I'm Tom Hudson. Have a terrific weekend.