Supreme Court will rule on Trump’s plan to end temporary protection for Haitians, Syrians

WASHINGTON- The Supreme Court agreed Monday to rule on whether the Trump administration can end temporary protections granted in the past to migrants who live and work in the United States.

At stake is the legal protection of around 6,000 Syrians and up to 350,000 Haitians.

The court’s announcement indicates that the justices want to resolve this issue in a written opinion rather than through emergency appeals.

Twice last year, the court’s conservatives overturned decisions by San Francisco judges who found President Trump’s Homeland Security secretary had exceeded her authority.

These cases concerned the temporary protection status granted to approximately 600,000 Venezuelans.

But the rulings have not set a clear precedent, and in recent weeks judges in New York and Washington have blocked the administration’s plan to end special protections for Haitians and Syrians.

Frustrated by what he called “indefensible” decisions, Trump Attorney General D. John Sauer advised the court to hear arguments and issue a written ruling on the matter.

The judges agreed Monday to exactly that. The arguments will be heard in April and the decision will be rendered by July.

Immigrant rights advocates have argued that repealing the special protection would be cruel and unfair to migrants who have established their lives and careers in this country.

In 1990, Congress authorized temporary refuge for noncitizens from countries experiencing armed conflict, natural disaster, or “extraordinary and temporary conditions” that prevent them from returning.

In 2012, the Secretary of Homeland Security extended this protection to Syrians in response to a “brutal crackdown” orchestrated by then-President Bashar al-Assad.

Last year, citing Assad’s fall from power, Trump’s secretary of state, Kristi Noem, proposed rolling back temporary protections for Syrians. The Syrians’ lawyers question how this could be considered an emergency requiring an immediate decision.

They speak of around 6,100 Syrians who have lived here legally for years.

These are “highly sought-after doctors and medical professionals, journalists, students, teachers, business owners, guards and others who have been stopped repeatedly and, by definition, have virtually no criminal history. The government apparently needs urgent permission to send them to a country in the middle of an active war,” the lawyers said.

In 2010, the Obama administration extended protection to Haiti after an earthquake caused death and damage in Port-au-Prince, the capital.

Judges in New York and Washington blocked the repeals and said the high court gave “no explanation” for its decision upholding the repeal for Venezuelans.

Those justices said the Supreme Court’s prior orders “involved the designation by the TPS of a different jurisdiction, with different factual circumstances, and different grounds for resolution by the district court.”

Sauer pointed to a provision of the 1990 law that says judges do not have the power to second-guess the government’s decision to terminate it.

“There is no judicial control over the determination of the [Secretary] with respect to the designation, or termination or extension of a designation, of a foreign State under this paragraph,” the law states.

In the three weeks since Trump’s lawyer filed his emergency appeal, two significant changes have occurred since then.

Trump fired Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem. And its war launched against Iran threatens countries in the Middle East, including Syria.

By agreeing to hear both cases, the justices did not disrupt lower court rulings that blocked the repeals for now.