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TEMPORARY PROTECTED STATUS PROGRAM CRITICIZED IN CONGRESS
At a hearing before the House Immigration Subcommittee, critics of the Temporary Protected Status program criticized it as a "backdoor" asylum program. TPS creates for immigrants in the U.S., both legal and illegal, a period of time in which they will not be required to return home. TPS recipients can also get authorization to work legally. TPS is granted when a county experiences civil unrest or an extreme natural disaster. Currently, for example, nationals of Guinea-Bissau are under TPS because of a civil war, and Nicaraguans and Hondurans have been given TPS as a result of the devastation wrought by Hurricane Mitch.
Citing examples of past instances where a temporary reprieve turned into a permanent amnesty, Mark Krikorian, the director of the Center for Immigration Studies, suggested that the program is sometimes used "as a fig leaf to cover political unwillingness to enforce the law." For example, in the early 1960s Cubans were granted temporary protection, but in 1966 it was made permanent by the Cuban Protection Act. Similarly, the temporary protection given Southeast Asians who fled the region during the Vietnam War became permanent. 
Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) did not question whether the program should be kept, but did question its susceptibility to fraudulent use. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) suggested that were the U.S. to offer help to those who wished to return home, perhaps more people would be encouraged to leave. Other defenders of the program point out that a person illegally in the U.S. who receives TPS again enters illegal status when the period of TPS expires, and by applying for TPS, the person has brought themselves to the notice of the INS.
There are currently 24,450 people in the U.S. under TPS, not including the tens of thousands of eligible Nicaraguans and Hondurans in the country as of the end of 1998 who have not yet applied.