The Trump administration’s decision to revoke Temporary Protected Status for Haitian migrants living in the United States is eliciting major concern. But one news interview of a Haitian restaurant owner about the impact also led to the owner disclosing that he voted for President Donald Trump.
The situation affecting 330,000 to 350,000 Haitians in the United States was the focus of a segment on the Wednesday evening (Aug. 5) episode of the CBS Evening News. Reporter Cristian Benevides was in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami, Florida, interviewing restaurant owner Wilkinson Sejour about the decision’s impact on his business.
Sejour’s Chef Creole restaurant business has already been affected, to where he has lost his entire management team at the restaurant’s seven locations, and is expected to close two of them.
After footage was shown of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arresting someone outside of one of his restaurants, Sejour admitted that he voted for Trump in the last election.
“What would you say to the president that you voted for?” Benevides asked. “He sold to me, that he is a businessman and that he would be making business decisions,” Sejour replied. Benevides then asked him if he regretted his vote, to which the business owner simply replied, “Yes. I do.”
The segment aired on the same day that U.S. District Court Judge Ana Reyes said that a previous order issued to stay the removal of TPS status for Haitians “was no longer in effect” after an earlier ruling from the Supreme Court in June.
Haitians had been shielded through Temporary Protected Status since a devastating earthquake in the nation in 2010. Trump (and Vice President JD Vance) had targeted Haitians during his 2024 election campaign, and former Department of Homeland Security chief Kristi Noem ruled that conditions in Haiti didn’t necessitate TPS status to be continued.
However, the State Department has strongly advised travelers to avoid Haiti “due to the risk of crime, kidnapping, terrorism, unrest, and limited healthcare.”
“How do you get sent back to a country that the American Embassy is saying, ‘Do not go over there?’” Sejour said of the situation in another interview with Local10 Miami. “This is very contradictory. I don’t understand it.”
