Appeals Court Allows Trump’s Termination of Ethiopia TPS

The case now heads back to the lower court that initially blocked the termination.

A Department of Homeland Security building and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services field office in Tukwila, Wash., on March 3, 2020. Jason Redmond/AFP via Getty Images

A federal appeals court overturned on Wednesday a lower judge’s order that had blocked the Trump administration’s termination of temporary protected status (TPS) for Ethiopians.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit’s decision comes less than a week after district Judge Brian Murphy granted an administrative stay, keeping in place deportation safeguards for thousands of Ethiopians living in the United States.

“The government’s request for summary reversal is allowed. … The matter is remanded for further proceedings in light of and consistent with [Mullin v. Doe],” judges on the federal appeals court said, referring to a Supreme Court decision last month.

The justices ruled in a 6–3 decision on June 25 that the federal government can end TPS designations for Haiti and Syria, which were similar cases to the one involving Ethiopia.

According to the high court’s ruling, justices also said federal law prohibited judicial review of specific legal arguments against the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) determinations on protected status.

Although the federal appeals court’s Wednesday ruling was a victory for the Trump administration, DHS special counsel James Percival indicated he was not optimistic about the issue being remanded to the lower court that had blocked Ethiopia’s TPS termination.

“A great win to be sure. But remember, the district judge already indicated that [he] would enter a new order postponing the termination on remand. That is the absurdity we are facing,” Percival wrote in a post on X.

This is a developing story and will be updated.