SCOTUS Allows Trump To End Temporary Protected Status For Certain Migrants

The Supreme Court ruled 8-1 on Monday that the Trump administration can remove Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for around 350,000 Venezuelan migrants who were allowed to remain in the United States under the Biden administration.

In an unsigned order that included no opinions, the Supreme Court gave the Trump administration the green light to end TPS for Venezuelan migrants pending an appeal of the case, likely paving the way for the administration to ramp up deportations, The New York Times reported. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a Biden appointee, was the only justice to say she would have denied the Trump administration’s request.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem kicked off the controversy over protected status for Venezuelan migrants in February when she terminated an 18-month extension of TPS for the migrants granted by Biden just before he left office. The extension would allow the Venezuelan migrants to remain in the United States and seek work authorization until October 2026.

After a lawsuit was brought against the Trump administration, Judge Edward M. Chen of the Federal District Court in San Francisco blocked Noem’s move to end TPS, saying that plaintiffs would have likely succeeded in showing that the secretary’s decision was “unauthorized by law, arbitrary and capricious, and motivated by unconstitutional animus.” The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit then rejected Trump’s request to pause the district court’s ruling before the case ended up in the Supreme Court.

In Solicitor General John Sauer’s appeal to the Supreme Court, he wrote, “The Secretary’s decision whether to designate, extend, or terminate TPS implicates sensitive judgments as to foreign policy and, in this case, the ‘national interest’—a discretionary determination that Congress expressly committed to her judgment.”

Monday’s order from the high court is welcome news for Trump after justices ruled against the president 7-2 last Friday, ordering the administration to pause deportations of suspected Venezuelan gang members to a prison in El Salvador. In that case, the majority ruled that the Trump administration must give detainees more time to raise legal objections. Only conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented. Trump blasted Friday’s decision, saying, “The Supreme Court won’t allow us to get criminals out of our country!”