Justice Department asks Supreme Court to end legal protections for Venezuelan migrants

The Justice Department on Friday asked the Supreme Court in an emergency order to allow the Trump administration to move forward with plans to strip more than 300,000 Venezuelan migrants of Temporary Protected Status. 

U.S. District Judge Edward Chen ruled earlier this month that Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem's decision to vacate extensions on the status for the Venezuelans exceeded her authority. An appeals court declined to put a hold on the order while the case plays out.

The request comes after the Supreme Court ruled in May that the Trump administration could move forward with its plan to end the status for Venezuelan migrants whose protections expired in April. 

Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued that the same decision should apply to the latest case, per the Associated Press.

“This case is familiar to the court and involves the increasingly familiar and untenable phenomenon of lower courts disregarding this Court’s orders on the emergency docket,” Sauer wrote. “[The] new order, just like the old one, halted the vacatur and termination of TPS affecting over 300,000 aliens based on meritless legal theories.” 

Temporary Protected Status is given to people from countries that are unsafe because of a natural disaster, political instability or other dangerous conditions. The protections are granted for six, 12 or 18 months and allow the recipient to work in the United States and prevents them from being deported.

Misty Severi is a news reporter for Just The News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.