The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments over the Trump administration’s efforts to end legal protections under a program that has allowed people fleeing war and other humanitarian crises around the world to live and work in the U.S., including Haiti and Syria.
The justices issued a brief order on Mar. 16 stating that they would take several cases challenging the administration’s push to remove Haiti and Syria from the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) federal program.
According to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ), the TPS Program grants thousands of immigrants from countries experiencing armed conflicts, natural disasters, or epidemics provisional work authorization and protection from deportation.
The court, on Monday, declined to immediately remove the protections, allowing thousands of people to continue living and working within the U.S. legally amid the administration’s rampant crackdown on immigration.
The case is scheduled for April, with a decision expected by the summer.
Since the beginning of President Trump’s second term, the administration has sought to end protections for nearly all 17 countries that qualify for TPS, which protects roughly 1.3 million immigrants.
The court has previously sided with the Trump administration on the issue, issuing two terse emergency rulings allowing the end of TPS for a total of 600,000 Venezuelan migrants, as lower courts repeatedly tried to maintain protected status for individuals.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration filed emergency appeals after lower courts halted the end of the program for 350,000 Haitian and 6,000 Syrian immigrants.
In response, the Department of Justice (DOJ) asked the courts to lift those decisions, hear arguments, and issue an order that would block courts from obstructing the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) decisions to end protections.
“Lower courts are again attempting to block major executive-branch policy initiatives in ways that inflict specific harms to the national interest and foreign relations,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in court documents.
