BOSTON (AP) — A federal appeals court ruled Friday that the Trump administration can end legal protections for around 430,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
The ruling by a three-judge panel of the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is the latest twist in a legal fight over Biden-era policies that created new and expanded pathways for people to live in the United States, generally for two years with work authorization. The Trump administration announced in March it was ending the humanitarian parole protections.
“We recognize the risks of irreparable harm persuasively laid out in the district court’s order: that parolees who lawfully arrived in this country were suddenly forced to choose between leaving in less than a month — a choice that potentially includes being separated from their families, communities, and lawful employment and returning to dangers in their home countries,” the judges wrote. “But absent a strong showing of likelihood of success on the merits, the risk of such irreparable harms cannot, by itself, support a stay.”
In a two-page ruling, the court lifted a stay issued by a district court and is allowing the administration to end humanitarian parole for those groups while the lawsuit plays out. The ruling Friday is a victory for the Trump administration but doesn’t change anything on the ground.
Esther Sung, the legal director of Justice Action Center, a co-counsel in the case, said the ruling “hurts everyone.”
“People who came here from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela did everything the government asked of them, and the Trump administration cruelly and nonsensically failed to hold up the government’s end of the bargain,” Sung said. “While we are deeply disappointed by this decision, we will continue to advocate zealously for our clients and class members as the litigation continues.”
A district court issued a stay in April halting the administration’s decision, but the Supreme Court lifted the lower court order at the end of May with little explanation.
The Trump administration had argued the appeals court should follow the Supreme Court and reverse the district court ruling.
The protections for people fleeing turmoil in their home countries were always meant to be temporary, and the Department of Homeland Security has the power to revoke them without court interference, the Justice Department said in a court filing.
Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that ending parole on a case-by-case basis would be a “gargantuan task” that would slow the government’s efforts to press for the removal of the migrants.
“The Secretary’s discretionary rescission of a discretionary benefit should have been the end of the matter,” lawyers for the government wrote in their brief.
Plaintiffs, including people who benefited from the legal protections, urged the appeals court to endorse the district court ruling, which found that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem could not categorically end protections for these groups, but instead had to evaluate each case individually. They also cited the district court’s finding that Noem ignored the humanitarian concerns that led to the legal protections in the first place.
“The district court applied the law correctly and did not abuse its discretion when it concluded that Secretary Noem’s action inflicted irreparable injury on the class members (among others) and that the public interest and balance of the equities tip sharply in favor of preliminary relief,” attorneys for the plaintiffs wrote in a brief.
Republican President Donald Trump promised on the campaign trail to deport millions of people. Since taking office, he has sought to dismantle Biden administration policies that expanded paths for migrants to live legally in the U.S.
The Trump administration’s decision was the first-ever mass revocation of humanitarian parole, attorneys for the migrants said in court papers, calling it “the largest mass illegalization event in modern American history.”
