November 8, 2025

Media Contacts:
Communications HBA, media@haitianbridge.org

San Diego, CA. — Haitian Bridge Alliance (HBA) denounces in the strongest possible terms the U.S. State Department’s newly issued guidance instructing consular officers to consider chronic health conditions—such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, obesity, and mental health disorders—when determining visa eligibility under the public charge rule. 

“If this guidance is allowed to stand, no immigrant applying for a visa or green card will be safe,” said Guerline Jozef, Executive Director of Haitian Bridge Alliance. “Any illness—no matter how manageable—could become grounds for denial. It is arbitrary, capricious, and fundamentally contrary to the principles of due process, equal protection, and human rights.”

Jozef continued, “Health challenges is not a crime. This policy weaponizes illness against the most vulnerable, punishing those who have already suffered under systems that deny them healthcare and opportunity. It sends a chilling message to millions around the world: that your humanity is negotiable, and your worth is measured in dollars and diagnoses. Haitian migrants, like countless others, flee conditions created by global inequality, climate crisis, and failed U.S. foreign policy. To deny them safe passage because of a medical condition is an act of cruelty cloaked in bureaucracy.”

“This guidance is not only discriminatory—it’s lawless,” Jozef stated. “It violates the spirit of U.S. and international legal obligations and undermines decades of progress toward fairness in our immigration system. We call on the Trump administration to rescind and reconsider  it immediately and reaffirm that health is a human right, not a disqualifier for dignity.”                                     

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ABOUT HAITIAN BRIDGE ALLIANCE

Haitian Bridge Alliance (HBA), also known as “The Bridge”, is a grassroots community organization that advocates for fair and humane immigration policies, foreign policy, and provides migrants and immigrants with humanitarian, legal, and social services, with a particular focus on Black migrants, the Haitian community, women and girls, LGBTQIA+ individuals, and survivors of torture and other human rights abuses. HBA also seeks to elevate the issues unique to Black migrants and build solidarity and a collective movement toward policy change. Anpil men chay pa lou (“Many hands make the load light”).
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