A federal appeals court on Wednesday cleared the path for President Donald Trump’s administration to end temporary deportation protections and revoke work permits for more than 60,000 immigrants from Central America and Nepal.
The US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruling allows the government to terminate Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from Nicaragua, Honduras, and Nepal while legal challenges to the policy proceed. The three judges who issued the order did not provide an explanation for their decision.
The order immediately ends protections for Nepalis, which expired on August 5. Protections for Hondurans and Nicaraguans are set to expire on September 8.
US Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said the decision will help maintain the integrity of the immigration system and prevent Temporary Protected Status from functioning as a “de facto asylum system.”
Ahilan Arulanantham of the UCLA Center for Immigration Law and Policy, one of the groups behind the lawsuit, criticized the court for not explaining its reasoning, calling the decision a “sanction of the government’s power grab.”
Earlier, US District Judge Trina L. Thompson had temporarily blocked the administration from ending the protections in a sharply worded July ruling, noting that the government’s actions appeared likely to be influenced by racial animus.
