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A federal judge has put the brakes on the Trump administration’s plan to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian immigrants, blocking a move that would have stripped protections from hundreds of thousands of people as early as this week.
U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes, who oversees the case in Washington, D.C., ruled Monday (February 2) that the administration cannot move forward with terminating Haiti’s TPS designation while the lawsuit challenging it plays out. According to Reuters, Reyes found that the plaintiffs are likely to succeed in showing the decision was made improperly, and raised serious concerns about whether the move was driven by hostility toward nonwhite immigrants rather than a fair legal review.
The ruling means TPS protections remain fully in effect for now, including work authorization and protection from detention and deportation.
The program, which applies to roughly 350,000 Haitian immigrants, was set to expire this week after the Department of Homeland Security moved to end it under Secretary Kristi Noem, Reuters reports.
In her decision, Reyes sharply criticized the administration’s approach, warning that abruptly ending TPS would turn hundreds of thousands of lawful residents into undocumented immigrants overnight, strip workers of jobs, and destabilize families and local economies. The judge additionally questioned why the administration was rushing to terminate protections given Haiti’s ongoing instability.
The Trump administration has already signaled it will appeal. DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said the department believes TPS has been misused as a long-term immigration solution and argued the ruling came from an “activist judge,” according to Reuters.
Haitian TPS was first granted after the devastating 2010 earthquake and has been renewed repeatedly as the country has faced worsening crises. Haiti is currently grappling with extreme gang violence, mass displacement, food insecurity, and a lack of stable governance — conditions that, according to UNICEF, have left millions in need of humanitarian aid.
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