Federal Appeals Court Rules on Immigration Program
A federal appeals court announced on Friday that President Trump is allowed to terminate the protected status for about 430,000 immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela (CHNV).
This decision overturned a previous ruling made by a judge in Washington, D.C., who had blocked the administration’s attempt to end the CHNV protection status in early August.
Judge Jia Cobb had previously deemed the move to eliminate this protection in March as illegal, stating that the process offered to immigrants was inadequate and could cause irreparable harm to those affected.
However, a panel of three judges at the First U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals determined that the earlier claims regarding the risk of irreparable harm were insufficient to prevent the administration’s policy change.
In their ruling, the judges acknowledged the potential for serious harm as outlined in the district court order. They noted that many legal parolees could be forced to leave the U.S. within a month, which would disrupt their families, communities, and jobs back in their home countries. Still, they argued that without a significant likelihood of succeeding on the merits, the possibility of harm couldn’t justify blocking the change in policy.
“In essence, the plaintiffs haven’t made a convincing case that the decision to end the CHNV parole program is likely to be found unlawful,” the judges stated.
This ruling represents another instance where a higher court has overturned a lower court’s decision.
In May, the U.S. Supreme Court also affirmed that the administration had the authority to cancel the CHNV program, allowing Trump officials to proceed with winding it down, even while appeals were ongoing.
In a split 7-2 ruling, Justices Ketanji Brown Jackson and Sonia Sotomayor opposed the decision, but ultimately the Court ruled in favor of allowing the closure of the parole program while the case remains in appeals.
The Trump administration encouraged the Supreme Court to facilitate the shutdown of the parole system, arguing that lower courts lack the jurisdiction to manage illegal immigration effectively or to uphold vital immigration policies that were rejected during the last election cycle.
