A Honduran man known by Duke University students for his popular campus bus rides faces uncertainty as his permit to live and work in the U.S. nears its expiration date.
For nearly two decades, Luis Alonso Juarez Hernández has built a reputation for his kindness and the welcoming environment of his unofficial party bus on the C1 route.
With lively Latin dance music like cumbia, merengue and reggaeton, he’s been known to cheer students up between classes, or who just ride for fun.
“I feel good about my job,” Juarez Hernández, 54, said in Spanish. “Everybody on campus wants me to stay at my job. The students here, they like how I do my job.”
But his beloved bus rides are in jeopardy as his legal asylum under Temporary Protected Status is set to expire on September 8.
Earlier this year, the Trump Administration revoked the renewals of Temporary Protected Status for Central Americans from countries like El Salvador and Nicaragua, as well as his native Honduras, where he hasn’t lived since 1995. A federal appeals court affirmed that decision last week.
“Temporary Protected Status was always meant to be just that: Temporary,” Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement last week. “TPS was never meant to be a de facto asylum system, yet that is how previous administrations have used it for decades while allowing hundreds of thousands of foreigners into the country without proper vetting.”
TPS was also ended for other Latin American countries like Venezuela and Haiti. Juarez Hernández and his supporters spoke at a news conference on Ninth Street in Durham on Tuesday afternoon organized by the Immigration advocacy group Siembra NC.
“I’ve been working this job for years, 19 years, and I never stopped,” Juarez Hernández. “I always show up on time to work.”
His supporters are calling on North Carolina’s congressional delegation to help him stay in the U.S.
"I feel desperate"
“Every day I try to find Luis’ bus,” said Joyce Thomas, a Duke senior. “If I can go on Luis’ bus, I will go on Luis’ bus. There’s so much that he adds. You can see him talking to all the students he can. It helps build the community at Duke.”
In July, faculty and staff submitted 477 letters of support for Juarez Hernández to Duke Visa Services in an effort to get the university to advocate for him.
Juarez Hernández says officials at Duke have not yet stepped in to help.
The university did not immediately respond to WUNC's request for comment.
Juarez says he first obtained TPS in 1998 under the Bill Clinton administration. He described losing it after nearly 30 years as “shattering.”
“I have my house here, my family, I have to pay my bills,” he said. “I feel desperate, I feel anxious. I’d like to keep my papers so I can remain here working and helping the students.”
Siembra NC activists say they plan to help Juarez Hernández get the attention of Sen. Ted Budd and other GOP congressmembers who could ask the Trump administration to grant an extension of protection of removal.
In his first administration, President Trump issued such a designation for Venezuelans present in the U.S. on or before January 20, 2021, granting them 18 months of deferred removal and employment authorization, for example.
“Luis is exactly the kind of worker Republicans say they want,” said Siembra NC's Co-Director Nikki Marín Baena in a statement. “He shows up, day after day, to help others and make this country great. He’s never been charged with a crime. His only mistake was, at age 22, while fleeing violence, not knowing what paperwork to fill out when he entered the U.S., so that he might one day have a path to citizenship.”
Juarez Hernández isn’t alone, as there are 27,065 other TPS holders like him in North Carolina. The status isn’t expiring for all of them, but it is for Hondurans, Nicaraguans, and Haitians this year. Protections for Salvadorans are set to expire in September 2026.
