Judge blocks Trump administration from ending TPS for Yemeni nationals
Days after the Supreme Court I heard arguments A federal judge in New York on Friday challenged the Trump administration’s termination of Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from Haiti and Syria, blocking the administration from ending TPS for immigrants from Yemen.
This was the last one a series of decisions Preventing the administration’s attempts to eliminate TPS protections that allow recipients to live temporarily in the United States to escape unsafe conditions in their home countries.
Yemen’s Temporary Protection Status was set to expire at midnight on May 4. Instead, the judge sided with 16 plaintiffs who were among nearly 3,000 Yemeni citizens living and working in the United States, some of whom have held that status for decades.
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Fourteen of the plaintiffs are current TPS holders and two are first-time TPS applicants.
U.S. District Judge Dale Ho ruled that the Department of Homeland Security, under then-Secretary Kristi Noem, terminated Yemen’s Temporary Protected Status in “blatant disregard” of the procedure established by Congress.
“This Court does not write on a blank page,” the judge wrote. “Defendants have terminated TPS in more than a half-dozen jurisdictions over the past six months under circumstances virtually indistinguishable from those here. And every district court considering the underlying claim asserted by Plaintiffs here has granted a motion to delay and/or vacate the termination of TPS for failure to comply with the necessary procedures established by Congress for doing so.”
A DHS spokesperson called similar TPS decisions “vigilante activism” on the part of judges, saying, “Interim means temporary, and an activist judge legislating from the bench will not have the final say.”
Nathan Howard/Reuters – PHOTO: Rally for immigrant rights outside the US Supreme Court in Washington
Yemenis have enjoyed temporary protected status in the United States since 2015, when the government determined that “requesting the return of Yemeni citizens would pose a serious threat to their personal security” in the midst of civil war. It has been renewed six times.
When then-Secretary Noem ended TPS for Yemen, she said: “Allowing TPS Yemen beneficiaries to temporarily remain in the United States is contrary to our national interest. TPS was designed to be temporary, and this administration is returning TPS to its original temporary purpose. We prioritize our national security interests and put America first.”
Judge Ho noted that, in his opinion, Yemeni citizens operate nearly half of the 15,000 family-owned grocery stores in New York City, and that TPS holders among them “form an integral part of business networks that employ and serve millions of people in the United States.”
The plaintiffs include a 33-year-old pregnant woman in Detroit who is due to give birth this month; this woman’s unborn child has a congenital heart defect that she says cannot be treated in Yemen; A 50-year-old former human rights worker from Brooklyn who was targeted by pro-Houthi militias in Yemen; and a 36-year-old medical clinician who works on cancer research in Houston.
“The decision to halt the termination of TPS is a lifesaver for my family; after months of existential angst, the moment has finally come when we can breathe a sigh of relief,” said plaintiff Hadeel Doe, whose court filing was filed under a pseudonym out of concern for her security.
“This decision means that my children, who are U.S. citizens, will not be returned to an environment that threatens them with violence or forced recruitment. It means that my unborn child, suffering from heart complications, will receive the specialized medical attention and care he needs right here in America,” he said.
