Trump cannot end protections for 350,000 Haitians, U.S. appeals court rules

Temporary Protected Status is a humanitarian program that shields eligible migrants from deportation and allows them to work.

A divided U.S. appeals court has refused to let the Trump administration revoke legal protections that allow more than 350,000 Haitians to live and work in the U.S. and avoid being returned to their gang-violence-stricken country.

A 2-1 panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit late on Friday rejected the administration’s bid to pause a February 2 ruling that blocked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from ending Haiti’s Temporary Protected Status.

Under outgoing Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, the department has moved to end TPS for a dozen countries as part of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, arguing the program was never intended to serve as a “de facto amnesty.”