A federal appeals court ruled on Wednesday in favor of the Trump administration, temporarily halting a lower court decision that had preserved protections for 60,000 migrants from Central America and Nepal.

The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco approved an emergency stay, allowing the administration to proceed with plans to remove approximately 7,000 Nepalese nationals whose Temporary Protected Status (TPS) expired on August 5. TPS protections for 51,000 Hondurans and 3,000 Nicaraguans are set to end on September 8, at which point they too will be subject to deportation.

“The district court’s order granting plaintiffs’ motion to postpone, entered July 31, 2025, is stayed pending further order of this court,” wrote the three-judge panel. The judges were appointed by Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Donald Trump.

TPS, a humanitarian designation granted by the Homeland Security secretary, allows immigrants from designated countries to remain in the US and work legally if their home countries are deemed unsafe due to crises such as natural disasters or political instability.

The Trump administration has pushed to roll back TPS across multiple countries as part of a broader immigration agenda focused on mass deportations. Secretary Kristi Noem has the authority to extend TPS if warranted by conditions abroad but has argued that the situations in Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua no longer justify the protections.

Immigrant advocates say the decision will uproot individuals who have built lives in the US over decades.

“The Trump administration is systematically de-documenting immigrants who have lived lawfully in this country for decades, raising US-citizen children, starting businesses, and contributing to their communities,” said Jessica Bansal, an attorney with the National Day Laborer Organisation.

LEGAL CHALLENGE CONTINUES

The ruling temporarily overturns a decision by US District Judge Trina L. Thompson, who had issued an order on July 31 to keep the protections in place while the lawsuit progresses. The next court hearing is scheduled for November 18.

In her order, Judge Thompson said the administration ended the TPS protections without conducting an “objective review of the country conditions,” citing political instability in Honduras and the aftermath of recent storms in Nicaragua.

In response to the ruling, DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said, “TPS was never meant to be a de facto asylum system, yet that is how previous administrations have used it for decades.”

Since taking office, the Trump administration has ended TPS designations for more than 1 million individuals, including 350,000 Venezuelans, 500,000 Haitians, over 160,000 Ukrainians, and others from Afghanistan and Cameroon. Many of those terminations are now being challenged in federal court.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs argue that the decisions were unlawfully influenced by President Trump’s political campaign and racially motivated intentions.

But at a court hearing Tuesday, US Deputy Assistant Attorney General Drew Ensign defended the administration’s actions, stating that the federal government is suffering “ongoing irreparable harm from its inability to carry out the programs that it has determined are warranted.”

Earlier this year, the US Supreme Court allowed the administration to proceed with ending TPS for Venezuelans. The justices offered no explanation, which is typical in emergency rulings, and did not address the broader legal questions.

– Ends

With inputs from Associated Press

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