US Supreme Court allows Trump to end protected status for Haitian and Syrian immigrants
The US Supreme Court on Thursday allowed the Trump administration to strip hundreds of thousands of Haitian and Syrian migrants of humanitarian status that protects them from deportation, giving another boost to the president’s hard-line approach to immigration.The court’s 6-3 ruling by the court’s conservative justices overturned federal judges’ decisions that halted administration actions that ended temporary protected status for more than 350,000 people from Haiti and 6,100 people from Syria.Justice Samuel Alito, who issued the ruling, wrote that courts cannot review administration decisions regarding temporary protected status, a decision that could doom future legal challenges to revoking such status for any country.
“The law governing TPS clearly prohibits such judicial review,” Alito wrote.
Kagan dissents: ‘Race played a role’
Justice Elena Kagan, in a dissent joined by liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, said the evidence that race played a role in the administration’s decision on Haiti was clear. Kagan highlighted several examples of Trump’s past statements, including his false claims while running for re-election in 2024 that Haitian immigrants were eating cats and dogs in Ohio, and that Haitian immigration is “like a death wish for our country.”
““The signs — filth, disease, primitivism — are depicted through racist stereotypes and tropes,” Kagan said. “It is difficult to imagine the statements being made today from any white community.”Alito said in his ruling that none of the aforementioned statements were “overtly racist” and could be “based on racially neutral justifications.”
Miller says Haiti is safe to return to
White House adviser Stephen Miller said the United States is completely closed to asylum seekers and that Haitian refugees with temporary protected status should leave the country, dismissing concerns about violence in Haiti by comparing crime rates there to American cities.
“The fact that there may be pockets in Haiti where crime rates are high, guess what? There are pockets in Chicago where crime rates are just as high,” Miller said.“America’s doors are completely closed to asylum seekers,” Miller said, adding that the administration has implemented agreements to send asylum seekers to other countries.The conflict has wide-ranging implications, affecting 1.3 million migrants from all 17 countries currently designated for temporary protection.
The Trump administration said such protections were always intended to be temporary. Acting U.S. Attorney Todd Blanche praised the ruling, saying the Justice Department “successfully defended the position that TPS was always meant to be temporary.”Phyllis Dorsainville, a TPS recipient of Haiti and co-founder of the Haiti Support Center in Springfield, Ohio, said the ruling puts thousands of families in immediate fear.
“Haiti is not safe, and everyone knows that,” Dorsainville said. “The court’s ruling does not change the reality on the ground or the contributions we make here in the United States.”In a separate 6-3 ruling, the court sided with the administration in defending the government’s authority to turn away asylum seekers when officials deem U.S.-Mexico border crossings are too overwhelmed to handle additional requests. The policy, known as “metering,” allows US immigration officials to stop asylum seekers at the border and refuse to process their claims indefinitely.
