The Biden Administration won’t extend legal status for some of Alaska’s refugees, and President-Elect Donald Trump has promised to limit immigration and end temporary protected status for certain groups. His first administration did end designations for some countries.
Alaska’s refugee community works in health care, child care, and infrastructure across the state — all industries that need workers. But many aren’t sure if they will be able to stay.
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Kettly Gregoire sat in her Juneau living room next to a blindingly-lit Christmas tree. In the kitchen, her nieces made chicken and a dish called salad russe — a Haitian salad made with potatoes and beets.
She came here from Haiti in the fall of 2023, to escape widespread violence. Some of her family was already in Juneau.
“It’s like Haiti is in war,” she said.
Gregoire is here legally under a humanitarian parole program the Biden administration began last year for Cubans, Haitians, Venezuelans and Nicaraguans to come to the U.S. temporarily. The administration said it won’t renew the program.
Haiti has been deemed an unsafe place due to “simultaneous economic, security, political, and health crises,” according to the Department of Homeland Security. The department says gangs have increased their hold on the country, which has left Haiti without a functioning government.
“Sometimes they come in your street and kidnap people and ask for a lot of money you don’t have,” Gregoire said. “And then sometimes they come on your street and burn your house.”
There are more than 1,000 people in Alaska who use refugee and immigration services because of danger or instability in their home countries — 33 of them live in Juneau. And like Gregoire, those people work in fields that often struggle with staffing, like health care,child care and construction.
Most refugees in Alaska don’t have legal refugee status. Like Gregoire, they have Temporary Protected Status, also known as humanitarian parole. TPS is a legal designation with different rules and protections. It’s quicker than refugee status, but once a country stabilizes, the people who use it must return. And it doesn’t give a path to permanent citizenship. When the designation expires every few years, the acting administration can choose not to renew it.
Currently, federal officials are required to give two months notice if TPS status is going to expire without renewal.
Humanitarian parole gives people fleeing catastrophe two years of legal residence. Then they must either return home, apply for parole again or apply for TPS. This is the program Gregoire used to get to Juneau. It was introduced by the Biden administration, which said this fall that it won’t extend the one for South and Central American countries.
These are different from the more traditional refugee program that offers a direct path to citizenship.
Now Gregoire serves meals at Wildflower Court, a long-term care facility that has struggled for years to find enough staff. She has been training to work as a certified nursing assistant and will take her CNA test in January.
Gregoire’s parole status expires next fall and won’t be renewed because the program is ending. She applied for TPS and is waiting to hear back. But she was told there is a three month wait to find out if she is accepted or not.
Haitian people can qualify for TPS through February of 2026. ButPresident-elect Donald Trump says he plans to heavily restrict the program.
“And if we go back over there, we are at risk to be killed,” Gregoire said.
She said the risk of violence is worse for people who return to Haiti from the U.S. because criminals will think they have more money from American jobs.
Zori Opanasevych is the executive director of New Chance, a nonprofit that has helped resettle Ukrainian refugees in Alaska who were granted temporary status because of violence from the country’s conflict with Russia. That program has been extended through 2026, but it’s not clear if it will be again once Trump takes office.
Right now, they can be here legally, but they have to keep updating their status, which is time consuming and costly. But they usually get to stay.
“Every year they reapply, so they have almost stability,” she said. “But it’s not, because every year they apply and they have to wait, and what if the President was to close it? We see it historically, it’s always been renewed.”
Now, there’s uncertainty about that renewal.
That’s a concern for Joyanne Bloom, who coordinates refugee resettlement in Juneau. She has helped several Ukrainian and Venezuelan families resettle in the last few years.
“I know they don’t want to go back,” she said. “There’s still a war going on in Ukraine. Venezuela is still not a good country to be in. People that fled there had good reason to leave, and certainly we know Haiti is not a safe place to be.
And Bloom said she worries about how the departure of Juneau’s refugee community would affect everyone else in town.
“So the thought for us of them getting sent back when they’re all working valuable jobs here,” she said. “I mean, they’re helping out in our community, and they’ve assimilated so well.”
Back in Lemon Creek, Gregoire’s eyes filled with tears at the thought of moving her family back to Haiti after working hard to rebuild their lives here. She said she misses her community in Haiti, but it’s too unsafe.
“I never want to leave my country, and it’s because our country is very insecure,” she said. “We came here like refugees, and we just want to be taking part of the community to help all we can.”
Advocates like Opanasevych say that if Trump ends TPS, refugees can seek other avenues to stay in their communities, like employer-sponsored work visas or asylum – but neither are guaranteed.
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