9th Circuit Pauses Ruling Stopping Noem From Ending TPS for Honduras, Nepal, Nicaragua
“This case, by contrast, involves a termination of TPS, an action expressly authorized by statute.”
Yes, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals issued a stay on a lower court ruling that vacated DHS Secretary Kristi Noem’s terminations of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designations for Honduras, Nepal, and Nicaragua.
The plaintiffs argued “statutory and constitutional challenges to those termination decisions.”
The district court ruled that Noem’s termination violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).
The 9th Circuit disagreed (I omitted the citations):
In 8 U.S.C. § 1254a(b)(5)(A), Congress precluded “judicial review of any determination of the [Secretary] with respect to the designation, termination, or extension of a designation, of a foreign state” under section 1254a(b). The government argues that the Secretary’s terminations of TPS for Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua are therefore unreviewable. In our recent decision in National TPS Alliance v. Noem (NTPSA III), we held that section 1254a(b)(5)(A) “does not bar judicial review of a claim that the Secretary exceeded her statutory authority.” No. 25-5724, 2026 WL 226573, at *9 (9th Cir. Jan. 28, 2026). But that case involved the vacatur of a TPS designation, an action that we held was in excess of the Secretary’s statutory authority. Id. at *15–16. This case, by contrast, involves a termination of TPS, an action expressly authorized by statute. At this preliminary stage, we conclude that the government has shown a likelihood of prevailing in its argument that the Secretary’s action is unreviewable because it is a “determination . . . with respect to the . . . termination . . . of a designation[] of a foreign state.”
In other words, Noem is allowed to terminate TPS protections, not vacate them.
The 9th Circuit also found that Noem’s “decision-making process” did not satisfy the arbitrary and capricious argument:
Specifically, the government can likely show that the administrative record adequately supports the Secretary’s action, that the TPS statute does not require the Secretary to consider intervening country conditions arising after the events that led to the initial TPS designation, and that the Secretary’s decision not to consider intervening conditions does not amount to an unexplained change in policy. See FCC v. Fox Television Stations, Inc., 556 U.S. 502, 514–15 (2009). The government also can likely show that the Secretary consulted with appropriate agencies, see 8 U.S.C. § 1254a(b)(3)(A), adequately considered conditions in Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua, and gave facially legitimate reasons for why terminating TPS for each country was warranted.
Noem ended the protections on July 8, 2025.
“TPS was never designed to be permanent, yet previous administrations have used it as a de facto amnesty program for decades,” Noem wrote on X. “Given the improved situation in each of these countries, we are wisely concluding what was intended to be a temporary designation.”
Honduras and Nicaragua received TPS on January 5, 1999, due to Hurricane Mitch. Noem explained why the conditions no longer meet TPS requirements, including that both countries have improved over the decades.
Nepal was granted TPS on June 24, 2015, following a devastating earthquake. Noem determined “there are notable improvements in environmental disaster preparedness and response capacity, as well as substantial reconstruction from the earthquake’s destruction such that there is no longer a disruption of living conditions and Nepal is able to handle adequately the return of its nationals.”
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Comments
bad bunny for the win
The January 9th opinion upholding the injunction was a clinton appointee and 2 biden appointees
This vacating the preliminary injunction opinion were clinton , bush and trump appointees.
when hurricanes etc smash into the east coast of the usa
does the american territory of pr take in mainland refugees and allow them all the opportunities that welfare provides!!?
All mainlanders are free to move to PR whenever they like. They don’t need anyone’s permission. Nor do PRs need anyone’s permission to move to the mainland. This entire issue has nothing to do with PR.
I have always been a bit confused as to why the United States needs to take any refugees at all. I recognize that there is some duty of Noblesse Oblige towards South and Central Americans, but I cannot see how resettling their citizens in our country helps their countries.
agree but its because of the welfare state
and the dumber I mean less educated they are the more the left needs them
the white collar workers are seen more as a gop thing
Ah yes, the administrative procedure act. The law that dictates what paperwork you need to file (and when you have to file it) to change your paperwork.
It’s single major use has been to stop policy changes the left doesn’t like.
You’d think that the response to a hurricane hitting a poor country would be that a wealthy country would help out with recovery and reconstruction.
But no, apparently it means we’re supposed to take their people into our country and keep them for decades…
Apparently, this last year has been educational for the leftist elites. First, they got educated about the definition of a woman. Now, they’re learning about the definition of the word ‘temporary.’ Trump is really the education President.
So now it goes to SC?
No, it goes back to the district court. This was only about the injunction.
What part of temporary do these retards not understand?
Trump admitted to friends that the only reason this aging, droopy-faced harlot with ludicrous hair extensions has her job is because she is banging Corey Lewandowski in front of her cuck husband. I want Trump to succeed with deportations and having this joke in charge hurts the cause. Buy Corey a young hot chick please.
The “legal” standard adhered to by these vile, greasy, lawless and dishonest Dhimmi-crat activist-“judges” on the federal bench is, whatever policy was created or adhered-to by a prior, Dhimmi-crat president, allegedly cannot be undone by a successor, GOP president.
We saw that farce played out with the DACA cases.
There is a ‘silver lining’ to all these law fare strategies the d/prog lefty/wokiestas are using. They eventually get slapped down at Circuit level or SCOTUS. Once they get rejected then that pretty well closes the door for that particular stratagem or one substantially similar to be used again. There’s only so many law fare arrows in the quiver and once they are fired off they are expended. Mostly the d/prog are interested in delaying v legal success. IMO their goal is simply to delay policy and statutory changes as long as possible in the hope that in ’29 they have a d/prog President and a d/prog controlled Congress.
Someone posted a chart of this and all similar cases on X the other day, there are more than a dozen of them.
D’s shop for an extremely biased, corrupt, Federal District Court “judge” – all D appointed, of course, and get a win at the District Court level. Which makes big news in the legacy liberal “mainstream” media.
Then, the administration wins at the appellate level, once at SCOTUS – though not a definitive broad decision that would have ended this nonsense. And the mainstream media barely covers those wins – if at all.
There are a couple of countries that have recently had TPS terminated and D’s have yet to file a lawsuit to try to block it.
The law clearly supports the administration’s actions, so the end result *should* be a definitive opinion from SCOTUS – or at least a definitive opinion from an appellate court that SCOTUS then declines to rehear.
So, the D’s get to obstruct for a year or two, but then this and all future administrations will have a recent opinion that has settled the matter.
ZERO consequences for the infinitely corrupt, extremely biased, D appointed political activists occupying federal district court seats.
President of El Salvador, when asked how he fixed his country so quickly, responded, “First, I impeached all of the judges”.