By admin 
A Haitian pastor who was on the path toward legalizing his status in the United States was given a last-minute reprieve on Thursday from being deported to Haiti.
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Molis Augustave was not among 89 Haitians who were returned to Haiti on Thursday aboard an Immigration and Customs Enforcement charter flight, according to the Haitian Office of National Migration. The flight arrived in Haiti’s northern city of Cap-Haïtien at 1:29 p.m. Augustave was initially on the manifest.
Augustave was arrested during a traffic stop in York, Pennsylvania, on Sept. 4, according to immigration officials. At the time, he was making food deliveries for DoorDash, his family said, a job he took after losing his Temporary Protected Status in late July, along with more than 300,000 other Haitians, after the Supreme Court cleared the way for the Trump administration to end the deportation protection.
Days after Augustave’s arrest, his wife, Omara Boniface Nunez, received word from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services that the petition she had filed to adjust his status had been approved. Prior to the filing of the relative petition, Augustave had filed a green card application.
Augustave, 33, was targeted because he had a final deportation order after his application for asylum was denied.
Guerline Jozef, executive director of the Haitian Bridge Alliance, also confirmed that Augustave was not on the flight. She and other immigration rights advocates are now fighting to keep him in the U.S. and help him secure his legal status, she said.
“Pastor Molis is an example of what Christ has called us to be. It is worrisome that ICE is racially profiling Black and brown people and ripping them away from their families, churches and Christian communities,” she said. “We have to stare down this machine of suffering with the full force of people’s power.”
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Jozef said she and others, including We Are CASA, a national immigrants rights organization where Augustave worked as an organizer before losing TPS, are grateful to those who pushed to protect him from being deported.
“Now we ask that his green-card case must be fully adjudicated on its merits without using his advocacy for justice or his insistence on due process being held against him,” she said. “We will keep fighting until Molis has full protection and is reunited with his wife and children and be safe from family separation.”
Augustave remains in detention in ICE custody. In a statement We are CASA said they are concerned that given its record, the Department of Homeland Security will not fairly review Augustave’s green card application. The organization says it is “calling on the agency to fully adjudicate the application on its merits without using Pastor Molis‘ advocacy for justice or his insistence on due process against him.”
Thursday’s deportation flight included 77 men 12 women and three children. It was the latest weekly aircraft since the Trump administration ended TPS, and part of what has now become regular removals from the United States of Haitian nationals.
Among those aboard were several individuals with criminal records. Each returnee was given 25,000 gourdes, about $192, along with food, water, medical and psychological assistance, the Office of National Migration said. The government also made 44 hotel rooms available for some who needed lodging.
This story was originally published September 17, 2026 at 5:39 PM with the headline “Haitian pastor with pending green card application pulled from ICE deportation flight.”
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