Nepalis Wonder If They'll be Forced to Leave the Country

In recent months, the Trump administration has ended Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for a number of immigrant groups in the U.S., including Salvadorans, Haitians and Nicaraguans. Now, Nepali immigrants like Ramba Regmi are bracing for bad news this week.

Regmi is one of nearly nine thousand TPS recipients from Nepal living in the United States, the vast majority of whom live in New York City.

Until 2015, when an earthquake struck Nepal, Regmi was an undocumented immigrant living in New York's Outer-Boroughs. But "because of TPS, I've been able to get a work permit [and] a social security number," she said.

Now Regmi is a small business owner, running a nail salon in Williamsburg. She said all the economic gains she's made over the years will come undone if she loses her TPS status. She's the only member of her family that's earning, and her husband, three grown kids and grandson, all living in Nepal, rely on her regular remittances.

"So much still needs to be rebuilt back home for my family and I still need to be supporting them," Regmi said. "I'm losing sleep over this, really."

Democratic members of Congress have been pushing for a TPS extension. But the Trump Administration, buoyed by Congressional Republicans, say there's a reason it's called Temporary Protected Status.

The Department of Homeland Security will make its decision this week on whether Nepal has adequately recovered in the three years since the earthquake, based on a ground assessment of conditions in the country.