Government ordered to reopen TPS registration for Venezuelans for 24 hours

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — A federal judge on Thursday ordered the government to comply with a previous court order blocking the Trump administration from stripping temporary protected status from Venezuelan nationals living in the U.S.

Senior U.S. District Judge Edward Chen granted a motion for compliance from the National TPS Alliance, an immigrant advocacy group, and ordered the government to update its website to reflect the accurate status of TPS for Venezuela.

The Barack Obama appointee also directed the government to reopen TPS registration for Venezuelans for 24 hours to account for an estimated 12-hour dark period in the online system that Venezuelans use to re-register for protective status.

Chen opened the Thursday hearing over the purported noncompliance by addressing the government’s argument that his Sept. 5 summary judgment order in favor of the alliance is not in effect until after 30 days.

“My view is that the order was effective immediately, and if there was any doubt, I am reaffirming that. That is why we went through the whole stay process,” he said.

In a statement, Jessica Bansal, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said the government’s argument was “troubling.”

“We are pleased the court rejected it and directed DHS to recognize the ongoing validity of Venezuela’s TPS designation,” she said.

The plaintiffs also said that the government’s actions had caused “widespread confusion and harm” to TPS holders, adding that some were “laid off from work, or held in detention and at risk of deportation, despite their protected legal status.”

Created by the 1990 Immigration Act, temporary protected status is offered to people from certain countries where violence or economic duress would make their deportation difficult or unsafe. About 600,000 Venezuelans were given TPS under the Biden administration, making them the largest TPS demographic in the country.

In January 2025, a month before leaving office, the Biden administration issued an 18-month extension of TPS protection for Venezuelans, allowing individuals to re-register for TPS through Sept. 10, 2025. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem revoked the extension as soon as she took office.

In their lawsuit, migrants and the National TPS Alliance claimed Noem’s actions were motivated by racial animus and violated the Administrative Procedure Act. On Sept. 5, Chen granted a motion for summary judgment, setting the government’s efforts to terminate TPS for Venezuela aside.

At the noncompliance hearing, Bansal said the government had not updated official websites in the immediate days following the court’s Sept. 5 ruling.

As of the hearing, the official U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services website states that the 2023 designation of TPS for Venezuela has been terminated, and only those who received employment authorizations on or before Feb. 5, 2025, would have their protective status maintained through litigation.

Bansal said the website should say that TPS for Venezuela is extended through Oct. 2, 2026, and that employment authorization has been automatically extended through April 2, 2026.

William Weiland, an attorney for government, said that the government will have to update its website based on Chen’s ruling that the court’s Sept. 5 order is effective immediately. He added that the government has taken “preparatory steps” to update its website and that it should be able to be done “relatively quickly.”

Bansal also raised an issue over an outage of the online application system Venezuelan individuals use to re-register for protective status that occurred on Sept. 10 — the last day registration was open under the January 2025 extension of TPS for Venezuela.

Bansal said that the online system eliminated Venezuela as an option for TPS countries beginning around 4 a.m. Eastern Time. Around roughly 12 hours later, Venezuela returned as an option.

She asked the court to reopen registration for 24 hours and accept applications that would be dated within those 24 hours as submitted before the deadline.

Weiland called the outage a “coding issue” and said that the agency sent people to fix the bug when it was alerted to the problem. When questioned about the option to reopen reregistration, Weiland said the government would comply if the court issues an order.

Chen directed the government to update its website by Friday, Sept. 12, at 5 p.m. Eastern Time.

He also said that it was a “modest” request to reopen registration for Venezuelan TPS for 24 hours and give the plaintiffs four hours’ notice to get the word out.

“It’s an unusual situation, whether it was intended or not, it does appear there was some significant period, at least 12 hours, during a critical day; it does seem appropriate to grant that relief,” Chen said.

Representatives for the government did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

On Sept. 10, Chen denied the government’s request to stay the Sept. 5 order, writing that a stay would “irreparably harm” TPS holders who would immediately face deportation, the ability to work, among other harms.

The government has already appealed Chen’s ruling granting the plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In a separate lawsuit, the National TPS Alliance is also challenging the Trump administration’s revocation of protections for immigrants from Honduras, Nepal and Nicaragua.

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