A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from categorically revoking a status allowing an estimated 530,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela to remain and work in the United States for up to two years under a Biden-era initiative.
Judge Indira Talwani of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts ruled Monday that the Trump administration must do a case-by-case review to revoke the status of migrants who entered the country under the terms of the so-called CHNV parole programs.
The Trump administration announced last month that it would terminate those programs and end parole status on April 24 regardless of the originally stated parole end date for migrants, in part because the initiative is inconsistent with foreign policy goals.
Talwani, an Obama appointee, in the order recognized the law gives the executive branch authority to make decisions on parole for migrants in the United States.
But she wrote “there is a separate question” as to whether Congress has granted the Department of Homeland Security the authority — after parole has been granted and individuals have entered the country on lawful basis — to “categorically truncate these grants of parole en masse and without individual review.”
Talwani concludes: “The answer is no.”
The judge wrote migrants in less than two weeks will be faced with two unfavorable options: continue following the law and leave the country on their own, or await removal proceedings.
Leaving the country on their own would mean facing dangers in their native countries, family separation and possibly not being able to pursue a legal challenge to the revocation of parole, Talwani wrote.
“If, in the alternative, Plaintiffs remain in the United States and await removal proceedings, they may be subject to arrest and detention, they will no longer be authorized to work legally in this country and their opportunities to seek any adjustment of status will evaporate,” Talwani wrote.
The Trump administration signaled it would appeal such an order. The lawsuit was brought by seven migrants represented by the Los Angeles-based Justice Action Center and the Arnold & Porter Kaye Scoler law firm.
A senior Department of Homeland Security official, in an emailed comment, said this ruling “delays justice and undermines the integrity of our immigration system,” but Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem “will use every legal option at the Department’s disposal to end this chaos, prioritizing the safety of Americans.”
The programs started in 2022 and 2023 allowed up to 30,000 nationals from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela countries per month to enter the U.S. for a two-year parole period and granted those individuals work authorization. The migrants were required to pay for their entry into the United States. They also needed to have a U.S.-based sponsor and pass vetting.
President Donald Trump on his first day in office signed an executive order seeking to secure the borders, which explicitly sought to end parole programs, including the CHNV.
The rule change asserted the CHNV program was implemented during the Biden administration in a way to bring a more orderly process to migrants entering the United States, but the initiative didn’t achieve that goal.
Instead, the encounters of nationals from the four countries at border entry points remained “unacceptably high” with the program in effect, the rule change states, and the overall migration of CHNV nationals to the United States increased.
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