A bipartisan group of Florida lawmakers is trying to help Venezuelans avoid deportation.
U.S. Reps. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston, Darren Soto, D-Orlando, and María Elvira Salazar, R-Miami, said Thursday they introduced the Venezuela TPS Act of 2025 to extend Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, to hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan immigrants already in the U.S.
The legislation faces a serious obstacle in Washington: the Trump administration.
Last week, the administration asked the Supreme Court to strip temporary legal protections from 350,000 Venezuelans, potentially exposing them to being deported. They asked the high court to put on hold a ruling from a federal judge in San Francisco that kept in place TPS for the Venezuelans that would have otherwise expired last month.
TPS allows people already in the United States to live and work legally because their native countries are deemed unsafe for return due to natural disaster or civil strife.
The proposed bill by the Florida lawmakers would automatically designate Venezuela for TPS for an initial period of 18 months, with an option for renewal.
READ MORE: Trump administration asks Supreme Court to strip legal protections from 350,000 Venezuelan migrants
“It is simply wrong to subject law-abiding Venezuelan families to a criminal, murderous regime that openly and flagrantly violates human rights," said Wasserman Schultz, in a statement. "TPS recipients are not criminals — they are here legally and nobody with a criminal record is eligible for protection. I'm proud to join this bipartisan effort to prevent Venezuelan families in my district from being unjustly torn apart while we continue to fight for a free and prosperous Venezuela under democratic leadership.”
“The oppression of the Maduro regime and the total failure of socialism of the 21st century has created dangerous conditions in Venezuela and a constant threat of political persecution,” said Salazar. “That’s why I am proud to co-lead the Venezuela TPS Act of 2025 — to ensure law-abiding Venezuelans currently in the United States can stay here until conditions improve and they are not forcibly returned to a brutal dictatorship.”
“I will continue fighting for a free and prosperous Venezuela, led by its legitimate President Edmundo Gonzalez and the Iron Lady Maria Corina Machado,” she said referring to last year’s presidential election results.
President Nicolás Maduro was sworn in for a third six-year term in January despite credible evidence that he lost July’s election by a two-to-one margin.
Trump argued in March that the U.S. was facing an “invasion” of Venezuelan gang members and evoked the Alien Enemies Act of 1798, a wartime authority he has tried to use to speed up mass deportations.
His administration acted to swiftly deport alleged members of Tren de Aragua to a notorious prison in El Salvador, leading to a series of legal fights.
Federal courts around the country, including in New York, Colorado, Texas and Pennsylvania, have since blocked the administration's uses of the Alien Enemies Act for many reasons, including amid questions about whether the country is truly facing an invasion.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
