Stuck in Limbo: Temporary Protected Status, Climate Migrants and the Expanding Definition of Refugees in the United States

There will be 1.2 billion climate refugees by 2050 as ecological disasters precipitate mass migrations around the world. The U.S. does not legally recognize climate migrants as refugees, instead adhering to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention that limits the definition of a refugee to individuals facing political persecution. Despite failing to expand the definition of a refugee, the U.S. has accommodated migrants displaced by natural disasters through a series of ad hoc fixes, most notably “Temporary Protected Status.” In Central American countries that were granted TPS, we encounter the paradox of the U.S. employing environmental disasters to justify continued extensions of this temporary protection, while addressing chronic conditions in the region. The central question of this thesis is, has employing the environment as a catch-all tool for Temporary Protected Status protection expanded the de facto definition of a “refugee,” for Central American migrants impacted by climate catastrophes and if so, how? Though TPS fills a gap in US law by providing de facto protections to migrants fleeing environmental disasters, the environment is being used as a catch-all tool for more systemic economic and political vulnerabilities in Central America. The environment is a catch-all tool for continued protection only insofar as it is not recognized as political, yet it is getting harder to employ the environment as an apolitical driver of migration. The precarious foundation of TPS threatens the hundreds of thousands of Central Americans that depend on this program to live and work legally in the United States.