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Republican heavyweights split over Haitian deportation fight

June 29, 2026 | | Print Article

The America First agenda ran afoul of two Buckeye RINOs as they rejected national sovereignty in favor of suicidal empathy.

In case lawfare wasn’t enough for President Donald Trump to contend with in endeavoring to uphold the promises that sent him back to the White House, the chief executive has routinely faced obstruction from members of his own party. As the Senate stonewalled the SAVE America Act, Republican lawmakers opposed to deporting noncitizens with terminated Temporary Protected Status found Ohio champions in outgoing Gov. Mike DeWine (R) and former Gov. John Kasich (R).

The former appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Jake Tapper on Sunday, where he reacted to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who himself hedged on removing all of the roughly 350,000 Haitians who’ve remained in the U.S. via TPS.

“It is not in the United States’ interest, certainly not in Ohio’s interest, to have people who are working every single day, who are supporting a family, who are buying houses, fixing up old houses, starting businesses, and then put deep roots in this country and really are contributing and yank them out,” asserted DeWine, who went on to add. “That is a huge, huge mistake.”

To support his position, the governor reiterated previously debunked arguments about the impact deporting Haitians would have on the healthcare industry.

As covered earlier this year, Fox News’ Bill Melugin shared data from the American Immigration Council that found Haitians ranked fifth among “Immigrant Healthcare Workers” behind workers from the Philippines, Mexico, India and Jamaica. With just over 102,000 Haitians holding healthcare positions, they only accounted for about 0.6% of the entire workforce.

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For his part, Kasich contended, “The Supreme Court has allowed TPS for Haitians to end, putting families in Springfield and communities across the country at risk of being sent back to a country in chaos. Congress can and should extend these protections.”

This too was readily debunked as Melugin echoed Center for Immigration Studies Director of Policy Studies Jessica Vaughn, who said, “A large share of Haitians (and Cubans & Venezuelans) who were allowed in under [President Joe] Biden did not come from their home countries but from 3rd countries like Chile, Brazil and Spain, where they had residency & work permits. So they can return there if they don’t want to go home.”

Melugin remarked, “The Haitians were dumping & tearing up their Chilean documents at the river’s edge [to] hide this fact from the US so it wouldn’t hurt their fraudulent asylum claims.”

As a reminder, as concerns about Haitians in Springfield, Ohio in particular rose to the forefront ahead of the 2024 presidential election, DeWine acknowledged some of the dangers posed to the local community by committing $2.5 million toward healthcare along with a law enforcement surge to deal with “inexperienced Haitian drivers and all others who disregard traffic laws.”

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Among those highlighting the disconnect between the governors and what the American people support, Fox News host Laura Ingraham reacted, “DeWine should run for President. Let’s see how popular this view really is.”

She also posted about Kasich, “This guy should run for President as well…oh wait…he already did.”

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Kevin Haggerty
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