A federal appeals court rejected on Monday a request by U.S. President
Donald Trump's administration to allow it to revoke the temporary legal status of hundreds of thousands of Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans living in the United States.
The Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
declined, opens new tab to put on hold a judge's order halting the Department of Homeland Security's move to cut short a two-year "parole" granted to the migrants under Trump's Democratic predecessor, Joe Biden.
The administration's action marked an expansion of the Republican president's
hardline crackdown on immigration and push to ramp up deportations, including of noncitizens previously granted a legal right to live and work in the United States.
States.
The administration argued Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem had discretion to categorically end the migrants' status and that the judge's order was forcing the U.S. government to "retain hundreds of thousands of aliens in the country against its will."
But a three-judge panel comprised entirely of appointees of Democratic presidents said Noem "has not at this point made a 'strong showing' that her categorical termination of plaintiffs' parole is likely to be sustained on appeal."
Karen Tumlin, a lawyer whose immigrant rights group Justice Action Center pursued the case, welcomed the court's decision. She called the administration's actions "reckless and illegal."
The administration could now ask the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene.
