Negotiations between the Biden administration and lawyers representing hundreds of thousands of immigrants living in the United States under temporary humanitarian aid programs broke down this week, prompting a Trump-era plan to revoke their legal status without court intervention. The way to the decision was opened.
After more than a year of deliberations in federal court, the Biden administration and immigration lawyers have decided that immigrant groups the Trump administration should not be allowed to live and work in the United States under temporary immigration laws. We were unable to come to an agreement on how to protect it. Protection Status (TPS) program.
Due to the breakdown of negotiations, about 337,000 immigrants from El Salvador, Nicaragua, Nepal and Honduras could lose their ability to legally live in the United States under the TPS as early as next year. The TPS allows the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to provide deportation protection and work permits to immigrants from countries experiencing armed conflict, environmental disasters, or other “extraordinary” emergencies.
Lawyers representing immigrants in Central America and Nepal said on Tuesday that the Biden administration decided not to agree to a settlement proposal in a long-running lawsuit over the Trump administration’s efforts to end the TPS program. Stated.
Ahilan Alranantham, the attorney representing immigrants in the case, said the lack of compromise means the Biden administration will defend the Trump administration’s decision to end TPS protections for tens of thousands of immigrants. Stated.
“The government’s position here and the government’s actions over the past 18 months are highly inconsistent with the president’s promise to protect this community,” said co-director of the UCLA Center for Immigration Law and Policy. One Arulanantham said. “This community has been living in limbo and terror for the past 18 months waiting for the Biden administration to deliver on its promises and protect them.”
During the 2020 presidential election, President Biden vowed to prevent TPS holders from being deported to “dangerous” countries.
A DHS spokesman said it could not comment on the pending lawsuit. “His current TPS holders in El Salvador, Nepal, Nicaragua and Honduras will continue to be protected for the next few months,” the spokesperson added.
As of the end of 2021, 241,699 Salvadorans, 76,737 Hondurans, 14,556 Nepalis and 4,250 Nicaraguans are enrolled in the TPS program, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) data. .
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Settlement talks, which ended this week, were filed in 2018 against the Trump administration’s decision to stop allowing hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Sudan, Nicaragua, Haiti and El Salvador to live in the United States under TPS authority. It stems from the lawsuit filed.
In October 2018, a federal judge in California barred the Trump administration from terminating the TPS programs in these countries, saying officials did not adequately justify the decision and that the termination was based on hostility to non-white immigrants. It said it had raised “grave questions” about whether it arose from As part of this lawsuit, the Trump administration has agreed to suspend efforts to terminate the TPS programs in Honduras and Nepal.
In September,. However, in 2020, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed the lower court’s injunction, saying the court could not infer DHS’s determination of her TPS. The panel of three judges also said it found no direct link between President Donald Trump’s derogatory comments about non-white immigration and TPS’s dismissal.
However, the Ninth Circuit’s ruling did not enter into force because attorneys representing TPS holders asked the court to consider rehearing it in a “grand court” or with the participation of all serving judges. did not. Shortly after Biden took office in 2021, his administration entered settlement talks with the lawyers of his TPS holders and put the lawsuit on hold.
Over the past year and a half, the Biden administration has announced extensions to the TPS program for Haitian and Sudanese immigrants living in the United States, but has not announced similar moves for immigrants from El Salvador, Nicaragua, Nepal and Honduras.
Now that the settlement negotiations have concluded, the Ninth Circuit will be able to decide whether to grant or deny the request for a rehearing of the case, said Arulanantham, an attorney representing TPS holders.
While the TPS programs in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Nepal and Honduras are technically set to end on December 31st, as outlined in government announcements, DHS plans to agreed to provide a 120-day phase-out period for The Salvadoran has a 365-day curtailment period from the date the government allowed the policy to end.
Arulanantham said the TPS programs in Honduras, Nepal and Nicaragua could expire early next year if the Ninth Circuit rejects requests for rehearing by Nov. 30. However, if the request is granted or not decided by November 30, Arulanantham said it will extend the TPS program for another nine months as part of the lawsuit’s provisions.
Arulanantham said the Biden administration could have avoided this situation by extending TPS programs in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Nepal and Honduras, as it has done in Haiti and Sudan.
The Biden administration oversees a record number of TPS programs, using powers to protect 16 groups from deportation, including migrants from Venezuela, Myanmar, Haiti, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Cameroon and Ethiopia.
Arulanantham said the program’s potential demise would also affect hundreds of thousands of U.S.-born children of TPS carriers.
“I am deeply disappointed that the Biden administration had a clear opportunity to end the suffering of America’s children and was unable to do so.
Editor’s Note: A previous version of this article stated that the TPS programs in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Nepal and Honduras could expire as early as December 31st. DHS agreed to implement his 365-day wind, although it was technically set to expire on that date. Salvadorian down period and his 120-day gradual down of other nationalities.
Camilo Montoya Galvez
