The Trump administration can end provisional humanitarian protections for Haitian and Syrian immigrants living validly in the United States.
By Catholics for Catholics
The Trump administration can end provisional humanitarian protections for Haitian and Syrian immigrants living validly in the United States, the Supreme Court found on Thursday, a decision that may permit the government to deport hundreds of thousands of people starting this year.
The 6-3 decision capsizes lower court orders and lets the Department of Homeland Security to rapidly terminate temporary protected status, a program that protects a total of 1.3 million people from 17 countries, according to a story by Newsmax.
The Trump administration contended that judges can’t second-guess immigration officials’ decisions about the protections, which were meant to be temporary.
However, attorneys said the countries continue to be unsafe to return, and the administration ended them in an unlawfully rash process stained by racial animus.
During his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump increased false rumors that Haitian immigrants were abducting and eating dogs and cats.
The Justice Department appealed to the Supreme Court after judges postponed the end of the program for about 350,000 Haitians and 6,000 Syrians. The high court sided with the administration before and allowed the end of the program for people from Venezuela.
But federal authorities countered by denying that racial ill will played a role. They also quoted a Supreme Court decision from Trump’s first term that rejected biased claims based on his social media posts and upheld a travel ban on several Muslim-majority countries.
Since Trump got back to the White House in January 2025, DHS has concluded the protections for people from 13 countries, including some that had been in operation for more than a decade.
Immigration attorneys say that the terminations were made even though countries like Haiti and Syria remain dangerous.
Created by Congress in 1990, TPS was formed to prevent deportations to countries undergoing natural disasters, civil strife and other instability.
It permits people already in the country to stay with work permits in increments of up to 18 months, but it doesn’t give a path to citizenship.
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