This is a little notice I missed when it came out on Election day, November 2nd. Makes you wonder if it was planned on a day when NO ONE would be paying attention.
Homeland Security grants extension of Temporary Protected Status for Somalis.
This Notice announces that the Secretary of Homeland Security (Secretary) has extended the designation of Somalia for temporary protected status (TPS) for 18 months, from its current expiration date of March 17, 2011 through September 17, 2012. The Secretary has determined that an 18-month extension is warranted because conditions in Somalia prompting the TPS designation continue to be met. Armed conflict in Somalia is ongoing and, due to such conflict and other extraordinary and temporary conditions, requiring the return of eligible individuals with TPS to Somalia would pose a serious threat to their personal safety.
We discussed Temporary Protected Status extensively here (one of many posts)when Haitians were granted this category of protection and we discussed it here (again one of many posts) when Liberians who had previously been given this privilege sought to extend it and succeeded (Obama extended TPS for Liberia).
The gist of it is—if a Somali gets in here illegally, or some Somali already here gets a deportation order they cannot be deported to Somalia. They can stay and work in the US. Roy Beck of NumbersUSA says essentially forever.
Maybe this is finally my answer as to why Omar Jamal (representing Somalia at the UN right now) was never deported after his 2005 conviction on immigration fraud.