Republicans worked hard in recent years to court Venezuelan American voters in Florida, convinced that their party’s focus on law and order and attacks on socialism could win over the fast-growing group. Their efforts paid off in cities like Doral, west of Miami, where about 40 percent of residents are of Venezuelan origin.
Many Venezuelan Americans basked in the attention and became devoted to the politicians who bestowed it on them, especially President Trump.
Their admiration has mixed with surprise and hurt in recent weeks, though, after the Trump administration moved to end Temporary Protected Status, or T.P.S., for more than 300,000 Venezuelan migrants in the United States, many of them in South Florida. The T.P.S. program allows migrants from certain unstable countries to live and work in the United States for a limited time; critics say it has allowed many migrants to stay indefinitely.
Now, Venezuelan Americans in Doral and beyond are trying to persuade the White House to change course before the 300,000 migrants lose T.P.S. in April. Their campaign is testing just how much political currency they have with Mr. Trump and other Republicans who had treated them as a key population.
On Thursday, a group of Venezuelans with T.P.S. sued the Trump administration in federal court in San Francisco over the decision to end the protection, claiming that the move was unlawful and “motivated, at least in part, by racial animus.” Two immigrant rights groups filed a similar suit on Thursday in Maryland.
Channeling their constituents’ concerns, elected leaders in at least three Florida municipalities — Miami-Dade County, Miami and Doral — have passed symbolic measures in recent weeks urging the Trump administration to reverse its decision or find another way to help law-abiding Venezuelans stay legally.
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