A federal judge has officially confirmed that the Trump administration may proceed with ending temporary deportation protections for hundreds of thousands of Haitians, marking the latest step, for now, in a legal battle that has already reached the Supreme Court.
US District Judge Ana Reyes issued the order on Wednesday, more than a month after the Supreme Court reversed an earlier ruling of hers that had halted the government’s plan to terminate the programme, known as Temporary Protected Status, for Haitians who fled political unrest and natural disasters in their home country, according to CNN.
TPS Termination for Haitians: What Did The Judge’s Order Actually Say?
Reyes’s brief order formally lifted the block she had previously placed on the administration’s move. “The court’s order, which had stayed the effective date of Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s Termination of the Designation of Haiti for Temporary Protected Status pending judicial review, is no longer in effect,” Reyes wrote.
According to guidance published by US Citizenship and Immigration Services, the termination formally took effect on 27 July, following the Supreme Court’s ruling in Mullin v Doe on 25 June, which reversed the district court’s earlier judgement postponing the designation’s end. USCIS confirmed that employment authorisation documents issued to TPS Haiti beneficiaries under categories A12 or C19 are no longer valid, and that employers must reverify affected workers’ status under Form I-9 requirements.
TPS Termination for Haitians: Why Had The Protections Been Blocked In The First Place?
The programme’s termination had faced repeated delays through the courts over the past year. Noem determined last November that Haiti no longer met the conditions required for its TPS designation, a decision originally due to take effect on 3 February, according to USCIS records.
Reyes issued an order the day before that deadline staying the termination, allowing beneficiaries to retain their status and work authorisation while litigation proceeded, a protection that persisted through a series of extensions before the Supreme Court’s intervention this summer overturned it.
TPS Termination for Haitians: What Happens Next For Haitian TPS Holders?
Although the protections have now lapsed, the underlying legal challenge is not over. The case being overseen by Reyes will continue, with Haitian plaintiffs still pressing claims that the administration acted with discriminatory intent when it moved to end the programme. The ruling arrives amid a wider pattern of disputes over TPS terminations affecting people from other countries, including Ethiopia, Burma and South Sudan, where judges have in recent weeks blocked the administration from proceeding while separate legal claims are weighed, prompting public criticism from the administration, which maintains that the status was always intended to be temporary.
With the stay now lifted, hundreds of thousands of Haitian nationals living and working in the United States under the programme face an uncertain path forward, even as their broader legal challenge to the termination continues to make its way through the courts.
