BOSTON (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday said she will halt the Trump administration from ending a program that allowed hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans to temporarily live in the United States.
U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani that she will issue a stay on the program, which was set to end later this month. The push to help more than half-a-million Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans is part of a broader legal effort to protect nationals from Ukraine, Afghanistan and other countries who are here legally.
During the hearing, Talwani repeatedly questioned the government’s assertion for ending the program — namely that it has the power to do and that it was no longer serving their purpose. She argued that immigrants in the program now face an option of “fleeing the country” or staying and “risk losing everything.”
“The nub of the problem here is that the secretary, in cutting short the parole period afforded to these individuals, has to have a reasoned decision,” Talwani said, adding that the explanation for ending the program was “based on an incorrect reading of the law.”
Last month, the administration revoked legal protections for hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, setting them up for potential deportation in 30 days. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said they will lose their legal status on April 24.
They arrived with financial sponsors and were given two-year permits to live and work in the U.S. During that time, the beneficiaries needed to find other legal pathways if they wanted to stay in the U.S. Parole has been a temporary status.
President Donald Trump has been ending legal pathways for immigrants to come to the U.S., implementing campaign promises to deport millions of people who are in the U.S. illegally.
Outside court, immigration advocates, including Guerline Jozef, founder and executive director of the Haitian Bridge Foundation, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, said attacks on this program contradict the Trump administration’s strategy on immigration.
“We hear the narrative of people coming her illegally and the administration wanting to erase illegal immigration,” Jozef said. “But, we clearly see today that is not the case. Even those people who have legal status, are paying their taxes and working are under attack.”
In motion ahead of the hearing, plaintiffs called the administration’s action “unprecedented” and said it would result in people losing their legal status and ability to work. The also called the move “contrary to law within the meaning of the Administrative Procedure Act,” which sets out the procedures that agencies have to follow when making rules.
Lawyers for the Trump administration argued that the plaintiffs lacked standing and that the move by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security impacting immigrants in the program, known as CHNV, did not violate the Administrative Procedure Act. They also said plaintiffs would not be able to show the termination of the program was unlawful.
“DHS’s decision to terminate the CHNV program and existing grants of parole under that program is within this statutory authority and comports with the notice requirements of the statute and regulations,” they wrote. “Additionally, given the temporary nature of CHNV parole and CHNV parolees’ pre-existing inability to seek re-parole under the program, their harms are outweighed by the harms to the public if the Secretary is not permitted to discontinue a program she has determined does not serve the public interest.”
The end of temporary protections for these immigrants has generated little political blowback among Republicans other than three Cuban-American representatives from Florida who called for preventing the deportation of the Venezuelans affected. One of them, Rep. Maria Salazar of Miami, also joined about 200 congressional Democrats this week in cosponsoring a bill that would enable them to become lawful permanent residents.
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