Trump admin pushes Supreme Court to throw out protective status for Venezuelan migrants

WASHINGTON (CN) — President Donald Trump called on the Supreme Court on Thursday to strip nearly 350,000 Venezuelan migrants living in the U.S. of temporary protected status.

The Justice Department accused a San Francisco judge of intruding into the nation’s immigration policy after Senior U.S. District Judge Edward Chen, a Barack Obama appointee, blocked Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem from stripping safeguards from Venezuelan migrants.

Without a pause from the Supreme Court, the White House warned that foreign policy decisions would be in the hands of judges, not the executive branch.

“The court’s order contravenes fundamental executive branch prerogatives and indefinitely delays sensitive policy decisions in an area of immigration policy that Congress recognized must be flexible, fast-paced, and discretionary,” U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer wrote in a Thursday court filing requesting a stay on Chen’s order.

Temporary Protected Status is a designation applied to nationals of certain countries where violence or economic duress makes deportation difficult or unsafe. Venezuelans make up the largest number of such status holders in the nation.

Before leaving office, former President Joe Biden issued an 18-month extension of TPS for Venezuelans. In February, Noem revoked the extension, ending TPS status for almost 350,000 migrants.

Venezuela migrants and the National TPS Alliance, an immigrant advocacy group, sued the administration in February, claiming that Noem’s actions were unlawful and motivated by racial animus.

In a Fox News interview, Noem called Venezuelan immigrants “dirtbags” and insinuated they were members of criminal gangs.

Chen said that Noem’s comments and en masse actions against all beneficiaries made it evident that she made sweeping negative generalizations about Venezuelan TPS holders.

“Acting on the basis of a negative group stereotype and generalizing such stereotypes to the entire group is the classic example of racism,” Chen wrote in his March decision.

The Trump administration argued that Noem’s comments raised no plausible inference of racial animus and claimed that her words were taken out of context. However, the White House worried that if upheld, the finding could have broad impacts.

“That spurious theory, if upheld, could be applied to invalidate virtually any immigration-related initiative of the Trump administration, and it ignores the Secretary’s reasoned policy determination justifying the decisions at issue here,” Sauer wrote.

The Ninth Circuit refused to immediately block Chen’s order. The Supreme Court requested a response from the plaintiff migrants by May 8 — one day after Noem’s termination was scheduled to take effect.

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