The White House is mulling with siding with congressional Democrats to grant some 270,000 Venezuelans in the United States “Temporary Protected Status.”

The Epoch Times reports:

As the United States tightens the economic screws on Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, the administration is figuring out what to do with the Venezuelan nonimmigrants in this country.

Lawmakers, the majority Democrats, are pushing for Venezuelans to be granted Temporary Protected Status (TPS), a designation that would protect those already in the United States from deportation and provide work authorization.

The status is granted to foreign nationals by the secretary of Homeland Security for such issues as an ongoing armed conflict (such as civil war), an environmental disaster (such as an earthquake or hurricane), an epidemic, or other extraordinary and temporary conditions.

According to the paper, “About 270,000 Venezuelans currently in the United States would potentially be eligible for the status, including 123,000 who are illegally present,” citing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Office of Immigration Statistics.

The Epoch Times reports the Trump administration is “reluctant” to back the idea.

Venezuelans have routinely been coming across the border illegally.

“Rio Grande Valley #BorderPatrol agents taking into custody a group of 168 illegal aliens near Hidalgo, Texas,” CBP RGV posted to Twitter in July, along with an image of dozens lined up between patrol SUVs and ORVs. “The group consisted of family units and unaccompanied children from Central America, Venezuela and Cuba.”

The Epoch Times’ Charlotte Cuthbertson was in Tapachula, Mexico in June and filmed a mob of Haitians trying to get visas to pass through the country to get to the United States.

“A lot of these migrants are from Haiti and Africa,” Cuthbertson narrates.

“And we just talked to someone who works in the facility and he said, about on average, 1,500 more people come in each day and about 500 go out,” she said.

Cuthbertson said the center is getting “pretty swamped.”

She says she talked to some of the Haitian migrants who had moved to Venezuela, but due to terrible conditions there, they’re now US-bound.

“Everyone’s goal is to come to the US,” Cuthbertson said.

And now those here illegally may get protections from the Trump administration.