The Nannies: Haitian TPS Women Who Raised South Florida's Children

The sun had not yet risen over Miami when Marie Shirley Sanon began her shift at Miami Jewish Health, a long-term care facility in the heart of the city. For twenty-two years, she has arrived before dawn, braiding the hair of elderly residents, adjusting their pillows, and learning the names of their grandchildren. She knows which patients prefer their coffee black and which ones need help recalling the day of the week. She has held the hands of dying men and women whose own children lived thousands of miles away. She is a certified nursing assistant. She is also a Haitian TPS holder. And as of July 27, 2026, her work permit has expired (NPR/APM Reports). Marie Shirley Sanon is not alone. Across South Florida, an estimated 158,000 Haitian TPS holders live and work, the majority of them women employed as nannies, home health aides, certified nursing assistants, housekeepers, and elder caregivers. They form the invisible backbone of the region's care economy, a workforce that has quietly raised other people's children, bathed other people's aging parents, and maintained the households of families from Miami Beach to Boca Raton. Now, in the wake of the Supreme Court's 6-3 decision in Mullin v. Doe, that backbone is being broken (FWD.us; Mother Jones). The Care Economy's Hidden Workforce Domestic work has long been one of the most invisible and undervalued sectors of the American economy. In Miami-Dade County alone, there are approximately 60,000 domestic workers, and 84 percent of them are immigrants. Haitian women occupy a disproportionate share of these roles. They are the nannies who raise children while their own children remain in Haiti, sent for by their mothers only after years of separation and saving. They are the home health aides who enable elderly South Floridians to age in place with dignity. They are the certified nursing assistants who staff the region's nursing homes and assisted living facilities, often working double shifts because facilities are chronically understaffed (Miami Workers Center/WeCount!; Florida Policy Institute). "We raise their children. We care for their parents. We clean their homes. And now they say we have to leave. We are not strangers. We are the people who built this community." The economic contribution of these workers is staggering. According to data compiled by FWD.us, the UndocuBlack Network, and the Haitian Bridge Alliance, Haitian TPS holders contribute $5.9 billion to the U.S. economy annually. In Florida alone, their contribution reaches $2.6 billion each year. They pay $805 million in federal and payroll taxes and $755 million in state and local taxes. Among the 158,000 Haitian TPS holders in Florida, 93,000 are active in the workforce, and 63,000 are homeowners, adding an estimated $19 billion in housing values across the state (FWD.us; CNN). Yet the women who perform this labor earn a median wage of just $12.19 per hour, compared to $19.20 for other workers in Miami-Dade. They work without sick leave, without paid vacation, and often without health insurance. They are excluded from many of the labor protections that other American workers take for granted, a legacy of the New Deal-era exclusions of domestic and agricultural workers from federal labor law (Florida Policy Institute). Nannies in the Shadows Farah Larrieux knows this reality intimately. An entrepreneur and the chair of the Miramar Haitian-American Association, Larrieux came to the United States nearly two decades ago. She built a communications business, earned community awards, and became a leader in South Florida's Haitian diaspora. But on July 27, 2026, she woke at six in the morning after her last overnight hotel shift, a headache pounding against her skull, and faced a future she could not control. She has covered the glass panel in her front door with paper, afraid that ICE agents might appear at any moment. She has stocked her refrigerator with food because she fears leaving home. She has memorized her attorney's phone number (NPR/APM Reports). Larrieux's story is the story of thousands. Across South Florida, Haitian TPS holders who have spent years or decades caring for other families now find themselves unable to care for their own. They cannot work legally. They cannot drive without fear. They cannot plan for tomorrow. As one anonymous TPS holder told NPR, "I feel empty. Like I'm living a nightmare" (NPR/APM Reports). The anonymous home health aide known only as "R." has spent years caring for "A.J.," a Holocaust survivor in South Florida. R. arrives each morning to help A.J. bathe, dress, and eat. She knows the numbers tattooed on his arm and the nightmares that still visit him in the dark. She has become more than a caregiver; she is a companion, a witness, a bridge between A.J.'s traumatic past and his fragile present. Now R. faces the prospect of deportation to a country that the U.S. State Department warns American citizens not to visit (WLRN). "These women are not just workers. They are family. They have raised our children. They have held our parents as they died. And we are about to lose them all at once." The Nursing Home Crisis The impact of the TPS termination on South Florida's healthcare system cannot be overstated. An estimated 13,000 Haitian TPS holders work as nursing assistants nationwide, with approximately 4,000 in Florida alone. These workers staff the nursing homes, assisted living facilities, and home health agencies that care for Florida's rapidly aging population. Florida is home to one of the largest and fastest-growing senior populations in the nation, and it already ranked last in the availability of home health care workers before the TPS termination (Mother Jones; WLRN). The Florida Health Care Association, which represents more than 650 nursing homes and assisted living facilities across the state, sent an urgent letter to the Department of Homeland Security in early July requesting exemptions for Haitian TPS workers in long-term care. The letter warned that as many as 35,000 healthcare workers in Florida could be affected by the policy change. "The loss of even a small percentage of these experienced caregivers would be detrimental to residents' continuity of care as well as providers who are already struggling to fill essential positions," wrote J. Emmett Reed, the association's CEO (Miami Herald; WLRN). Key Statistics: Haitian TPS Workers in Healthcare 13,000 nursing assistants nationwide are Haitian TPS holders 4,000 Haitian TPS nursing assistants in Florida 35,000 healthcare workers in Florida potentially affected by TPS termination 64% of Florida home health aides are immigrants 50% of U.S. nursing homes limit admissions due to staffing shortages Margarette Nerette, vice president of SEIU 1199FL, the largest healthcare workers' union in Florida, has been overwhelmed with calls from union members who have lost their work authorization. At one nursing home she works with, approximately 30 of 100 employees are TPS holders. "I don't know how we're going to survive this," Nerette said. "The workers are suffering, but the patients are going to suffer more" (Mother Jones). Rachel Blumberg, CEO of Sinai Residences, a senior living community in Boca Raton, employs approximately 40 Haitian TPS workers. She has become an outspoken advocate for her employees, testifying before local officials about the devastating impact the termination will have on residents. Many of her residents are Holocaust survivors and elderly Jewish immigrants who depend on the continuity of care provided by caregivers who know their histories, their medications, and their preferences (Miami Herald; Mother Jones). Children Caring for Other People's Children Perhaps the most poignant dimension of this crisis is the separation of families. An estimated 50,000 U.S. citizen children have at least one parent with Haitian TPS. If their parents lose work authorization and face deportation, approximately 25,000 of those children could be pushed into poverty (FWD.us). These are American children, born on American soil, who face the prospect of losing their parents to deportation or being forced to relocate to a country that is in the midst of a catastrophic humanitarian crisis. The nannies who raise South Florida's children often do so at the cost of raising their own. Many Haitian TPS women left their children in Haiti when they came to the United States, sending remittances home each month to pay for school fees, food, and housing. They have spent years, sometimes decades, working to bring their children to the United States. Now those reunifications may never happen. The children who were left behind in Haiti are now facing the prospect of being left behind again, this time permanently (Miami Workers Center/WeCount!; ReportWire). "I have raised American children for fifteen years. I know their favorite foods, their fears, their dreams. My own children are in Haiti. I have not seen them in five years. I work so they can eat. Now I cannot work. Now I cannot feed them." The Economic Shockwave The termination of TPS for Haitian workers is not merely a humanitarian crisis; it is an economic earthquake for South Florida. Haitian TPS holders contribute an estimated $1.5 billion annually to the Miami metro economy alone. They are not only caregivers but also hotel housekeepers who turn over 60,000 rooms daily, cooks who prepare 880,000 meals each day, and package handlers who deliver 900,000 parcels daily (FWD.us; CNN). Jan Gautam, CEO of IHRMC Hotels, which operates several properties in Florida, estimates that 30 percent of Florida's hotel staff are Haitian TPS holders. The loss of these workers threatens to cripple the hospitality industry at the peak of summer season. Hotels that cannot staff housekeeping departments may be forced to reduce room capacity, raise prices, or close entirely (NBC 6). 158,000 Haitian TPS holders in Florida 93,000 In Florida workforce $2.6B Annual FL economic contribution 63,000 Homeowners in Florida 8,000 Caregivers serving 12,000 daily $5.9B National economic contribution Jackson Health System, Miami's public hospital network, estimates it will lose approximately 50 employees due to the TPS expiration. Memorial Healthcare System reported 27 affected employees. Catholic Health Services expects to lose about 40 workers. Each of these losses represents a clinician who touches patients every day, a nurse who knows the rhythms of the transplant floor, an aide who understands the needs of elderly patients (NBC 6; Miami Herald). Martha Baker, president of the union representing 5,000 nurses and healthcare professionals at Jackson Health System, described the impact in visceral terms. "I know on one floor, the transplant floor, there are two Haitian nurses who can no longer work at Jackson," she said. "So that's a real hit to one floor" (NBC 6). The Women Who Stay: Stories from the Front Lines Marie Shirley Sanon, the CNA at Miami Jewish Health, arrived at work on July 28 knowing that her work permit had expired the day before. She did not know if she would be turned away. She did not know if ICE would be waiting. She came anyway, because her patients needed her. She has spent 22 years in the same facility, watching residents arrive and watching them leave, some to go home, some to the hospital, some to the morgue. She knows them by name, by family history, by the small quirks that make each person unique. She is not simply a certified nursing assistant. She is a fixture, a constant, a source of stability in a world that offers little of it (WLRN; Mother Jones). "When you work in a nursing home, you become family," Sanon told a reporter from WLRN earlier this year. "The residents, they depend on you. They call you when they are scared. They call you when they are happy. They call you when they need someone to listen. I cannot abandon them" (WLRN). The anonymous home health aide known as "R." understands this bond intimately. Her patient, "A.J.," is a 94-year-old Holocaust survivor who lives alone in a modest apartment in Miami Beach. A.J. fled Nazi Germany as a child, lost his parents in the camps, and built a new life in America. He has no living family members. R. is his only regular human contact. She shops for his groceries, manages his medications, and sits with him when the memories of the camps become overwhelming. She has done this work for eight years. She has never missed a day (WLRN). "I am not just a home health aide. I am his daughter. I am his friend. I am the person who makes sure he does not die alone. And now they want to take me away from him." Nina (a pseudonym used by Mother Jones to protect her identity) works as a certified nursing assistant at two nursing homes in South Florida. She came to the United States after the 2010 earthquake with her two children. She obtained her CNA license, worked through the COVID-19 pandemic holding the hands of dying patients when family visits were forbidden, and has dedicated her life to caring for others. Now she faces deportation to a country where her former neighborhood in Port-au-Prince has been overrun by gangs. "My country is still a war zone," she told Mother Jones. "Going back right now is a death sentence" (Mother Jones). Employers Become Advocates Perhaps the most striking development in the wake of the Mullin v. Doe decision has been the emergence of employers as vocal advocates for their Haitian TPS employees. Wealthy families from Miami Beach, nursing home administrators, hotel executives, and even Holocaust survivors have spoken out publicly about the irreplaceable value of the workers they employ (Miami Herald). Rachel Blumberg of Sinai Residences has become particularly prominent, arguing that the termination of TPS represents not only a moral failure but a practical catastrophe for the elderly residents she serves. "These women are not just workers," she said at a community rally in Boca Raton. "They are family. They have raised our children. They have held our parents as they died. And we are about to lose them all at once" (Miami Herald). The Florida Health Care Association's letter to DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin represented an unprecedented step for an industry group that typically avoids taking positions on immigration policy. The letter argued that the loss of Haitian TPS workers would create "a ripple effect that could overwhelm our local hospitals and the entire healthcare system" (WLRN). That assessment was echoed by Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a distinguished professor of public health at Hunter College, who told PolitiFact that nursing home administrators across Florida are "all saying this is a crisis" (PolitiFact). The Legal Landscape and the Fight Ahead The Supreme Court's ruling in Mullin v. Doe was a 6-3 decision that allowed the Trump administration to proceed with the termination of TPS for Haiti and Syria. The Court held that TPS holders are not entitled to court orders postponing the end of their protections while litigation is pending. The ruling effectively stripped deportation protections and work permits from approximately 330,000 Haitians nationwide (FWD.us; CNN). Former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had initially announced the termination in January 2025, arguing that conditions in Haiti had improved sufficiently to allow for the safe return of Haitian nationals. This assertion was sharply contradicted by the State Department, which continues to advise American citizens not to travel to Haiti due to widespread gang violence, kidnappings, and the collapse of basic infrastructure. The main airport in Port-au-Prince remains closed to commercial flights after multiple planes were struck by gunfire (CNN; Mother Jones). In Congress, a bipartisan bill that would extend TPS protections for Haitians until 2029 has passed the House but faces an uncertain future in the Senate. The bill has drawn support from Florida Republicans including Representatives Carlos Gimenez, Maria Elvira Salazar, and Mario Diaz-Balart. "Haiti is a failed state, and I think that deporting Haitians who are under TPS right now back to Haiti would be a huge mistake," Gimenez told CBS News (Mother Jones; Miami Herald). Timeline: Haitian TPS Termination 1990: TPS program created by Congress January 12, 2010: Earthquake devastates Haiti; TPS granted 2017-2018: First Trump administration attempts termination; courts block January 2025: Trump returns; Noem announces termination June 25, 2026: Mullin v. Doe decided 6-3; Supreme Court allows termination July 27, 2026: TPS work permits expire for approximately 330,000 Haitians Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski traveled to Washington D.C. to advocate for the Senate version of the bill, calling on lawmakers to extend TPS for three additional years. "They are working hard at many jobs nobody else would take or want," Wenski said. "Having them removed from the workforce will have a negative impact on our economies." When asked about the Senate's response, Wenski was candid: "They're sympathetic, but they don't think it'll pass" (Local 10). The Human Cost of a Policy Decision Behind every statistic in this article is a human being. Behind the 13,000 nursing assistants is a woman who missed her daughter's wedding because she could not afford the plane ticket to Haiti. Behind the $12.19 median wage is a mother who sends half her income to relatives in Port-au-Prince because the alternative is starvation. Behind the 63,000 homeowners is a family that spent fifteen years saving for a down payment, only to face the prospect of losing everything (ReportWire). The mental health toll has been devastating. Callers to the Haitian Bridge Alliance's hotline describe suicidal ideation, severe anxiety, and the inability to eat or sleep. Children are asking their parents whether ICE will come to their schools. Elderly patients are asking their caregivers why they look so sad. The weight of uncertainty is crushing an entire community (ReportWire). One TPS holder, speaking to ReportWire on condition of anonymity, captured the experience with devastating precision. "I am breathing, but I am not living," she said. "Every morning I wake up and I wonder if this is the day they come for me. Every night I go to sleep and I wonder if I will see my children again. The world goes on around me, but I am frozen. I am breathing, but I am not living" (ReportWire). What Happens Next The expiration of work permits on July 27, 2026, does not mean that all 330,000 Haitian TPS holders will be deported immediately. The Department of Homeland Security has stated that it will prioritize the deportation of individuals with criminal records, and some TPS holders may qualify for other forms of relief, including asylum, green cards through family sponsorship, or U visas for crime victims (NPR/APM Reports; CNN). But for the vast majority of Haitian TPS holders, the path forward is uncertain at best. Applying for asylum requires navigating a complex and overburdened legal system with limited access to attorneys. Family-based green card applications can take years and require the applicant to leave the country, triggering a ten-year bar on reentry for those who have accrued unlawful presence. The U visa has a congressionally mandated cap of 10,000 per year, and the waiting list is already years long (Americans for Immigrant Justice; NBC 6). "We are not asking for charity. We are asking for the chance to continue contributing to the country we have called home for sixteen years. We are asking to stay alive." For those who cannot regularize their status, the choice is agonizing. They can remain in the United States without authorization, living in the shadows, working in the underground economy, and living in constant fear of deportation. They can accept the government's offer of $2,600 and a one-way flight to Haiti, a country that cannot guarantee their safety. Or they can attempt to cross into Canada, a country that has already tightened its border policies in response to anticipated increases in asylum seekers (NPR/APM Reports). None of these options are acceptable to a woman like Marie Shirley Sanon, who has spent 22 years caring for Miami's elderly and now faces the prospect of being cared for herself in a detention center. None of them make sense for Farah Larrieux, who has built a business, led a community organization, and become a pillar of Miramar's civic life. None of them offer dignity to "R.," whose patient A.J. will almost certainly die alone if she is deported. The Broader Implications The termination of TPS for Haitians is not occurring in a vacuum. It is part of a broader assault on the Temporary Protected Status program that has already seen protections terminated for immigrants from Venezuela, Honduras, Nicaragua, Somalia, and Burma. The Trump administration has systematically targeted TPS, arguing that the program was intended to be temporary and that it has become a de facto asylum system (Mother Jones). But the consequences of this policy extend far beyond the immigrants directly affected. The U.S. population is aging rapidly. The 65-and-older population is expected to grow from 58 million to 82 million by 2050, a 42 percent increase. These older Americans will require caregivers, and there are already not enough of them. The home health aide workforce is projected to grow by 25 percent in the coming decade, but wages remain low, benefits are scarce, and turnover is high. Deporting thousands of experienced caregivers will not solve this problem. It will make it catastrophically worse (Florida Policy Institute; Mother Jones). The same is true of the childcare sector. Nannies and home childcare providers are in chronically short supply across the United States. In Miami-Dade, where 84 percent of domestic workers are immigrants, the loss of Haitian TPS workers will leave thousands of families scrambling to find care for their children and aging parents. The economic ripple effects will be felt not only by the families who can no longer find caregivers but by the employers who depend on those families' labor. When a nurse cannot find a nanny, she cannot go to work. When a home health aide is deported, her elderly patient must move to a nursing home at public expense (Miami Workers Center/WeCount!; Florida Policy Institute). Conclusion: A Community in Limbo The women who clean South Florida's homes, care for its children, and tend to its elderly are not anonymous statistics. They are mothers and daughters, churchgoers and community leaders, homeowners and small business owners. They have spent sixteen years building lives in the United States under the protection of a program that the government itself created. They have followed the rules, paid their taxes, and contributed billions of dollars to the economy. And now they are being told that their time is up (FWD.us; CNN; ReportWire). On July 27, 2026, the work permits expired. On July 29, 2026, the community is in limbo, waiting to see whether ICE will come, whether Congress will act, whether the courts will intervene again, whether any of the promised protections will materialize. In Little Haiti, attendance at Mass has dropped sharply because parishioners are afraid to leave their homes. In Miramar, Farah Larrieux keeps her paper-covered front door locked and her attorney's number memorized. In Miami Beach, an anonymous home health aide continues to care for a Holocaust survivor who has no one else (NPR/APM Reports; WLRN; Mother Jones). The nannies and caregivers who raised South Florida's children did not ask for much. They asked for the chance to work, to contribute, to build a life for their families. They asked for the safety that the TPS program was designed to provide. They asked to be seen not as a problem to be solved but as neighbors to be valued. Sixteen years after the earthquake that brought them here, the answer from the United States government has been unequivocal: your labor was welcome, but you are not (FWD.us; ReportWire). As one TPS holder told NPR on the morning her work permit expired, "I can tell you that I feel empty. Like I'm living a nightmare." The nightmare is not over. For 330,000 Haitians and the families who depend on them, it is only beginning (NPR/APM Reports). Works Cited CNN. "These Haitian immigrants contribute nearly $6 billion to the US economy. Now they could be forced to leave." CNN, 28 Apr. 2026, www.cnn.com/2026/04/28/us/haitian-tps-economic-contribution/index.html. Florida Policy Institute. "Hidden Labor in the Sunshine State: The Economic Contributions of Immigrant Domestic Workers." Florida Policy Institute, 2025, www.floridapolicy.org/posts/hidden-labor-sunshine-state. FWD.us, UndocuBlack Network, and Haitian Bridge Alliance. "Haitian TPS Holders Make the US Stronger." FWD.us, Jan. 2026, www.fwd.us/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Haiti-TPS-Fact-Sheet_January-2026.pdf. Kirpalani, Reshma. "Haitian TPS holders in South Florida brace for end of their legal status." NPR/APM Reports, 29 July 2026, www.npr.org/2026/07/29/nx-s1-5910837/haiti-tps-florida-trump-immigration. Miami Herald. "As work permits expire, South Florida rallies to support Haitian TPS holders." Miami Herald, 10 July 2026, www.miamiherald.com/news/local/immigration/article316281925.html. Miami Workers Center and WeCount! "Miami Domestic Workers Alliance Report." miamidomesticworkers.org, 2026, www.miamidomesticworkers.org/reports. Morel, Laura C. "Florida's Nursing Homes Are Bracing for Life Without Haitian TPS Workers." Mother Jones, 20 July 2026, www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/07/floridas-nursing-homes-are-bracing-for-life-without-haitian-tps-workers/. NBC 6 South Florida. "Revoking TPS would create crisis for health care, South Florida hospitals warn." NBC 6, 3 Feb. 2026, www.nbcmiami.com/news/local/revoking-tps-healthcare-crisis/. ReportWire. "'I am breathing, but I am not living': Haitian TPS holders describe the mental health toll of the termination." ReportWire, July 2026, www.reportwire.org/haitian-tps-mental-health. WLRN. "Terminating protections for Haitians could deal blow to elder care in South Florida." WLRN, 31 Mar. 2026, www.wlrn.org/immigration/2026-03-31/haitian-tps-elder-care-impact.