Supreme Court to consider Trump administration’s efforts to end deportation protections for Syrians, Haitians

Washington — The Supreme Court on Monday said it will consider the Trump administration’s efforts to roll back temporary deportation protections for thousands of immigrants from Syria and Haiti.

While agreeing to take up the legal battle over Temporary Protected Status for the two countries, the Supreme Court did not allow the Trump administration to end the programs while it considers the case. The Justice Department had asked the high court to grant it emergency relief and freeze lower court orders blocking Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s decisions to terminate TPS for Syria and Haiti.

The Supreme Court instead said in a brief unsigned order it is deferring consideration of the requests, leaving those lower court rulings in place for now. It set oral arguments in the cases for late April.

The disputes over legal protections for immigrants from Haiti and Syria are the latest involving President Trump’s immigration agenda to land before the Supreme Court in its current term. The high court also will hear arguments April 1 on the legality of the president’s plan to end birthright citizenship. Decisions in each of those cases will likely come by the end of June or early July.

The Supreme Court has already allowed the administration to lift deportation protections for more than 300,000 Venezuelans in the U.S.. The Department of Homeland Security has also moved to terminate TPS designations for at least a dozen other countries, including Afghanistan, Haiti, Nicaragua, Somalia and Yemen.

This is a developing story and will be updated.