TPS Alert

On Oct. 3, 2018, in Ramos, et al v. Nielsen, et al., No. 18-cv-01554 (N.D. Cal. Oct. 3, 2018) (PDF, 1.29 MB), the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California enjoined DHS from implementing and enforcing the decisions to terminate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Sudan, Nicaragua, Haiti, and El Salvador, pending further resolution of the case (“Order” or “injunction”). To implement the Court’s Order, on Oct. 31, 2018, DHS published a Federal Register Notice (FRN) announcing that the TPS designations for Sudan, Haiti, El Salvador, and Nicaragua remain in effect so long as the Court’s Order continues.

The FRN further describes the steps DHS is taking to comply with the Court’s Order, including automatically extending through April 2, 2019, the validity of certain specified documents for beneficiaries under the TPS designations for Sudan and Nicaragua: Employment Authorization Documents (EADs), Form I-94, Arrival/Departure Record, and Form I-797, Notice of Action, collectively TPS-related documentation. The extensions will allow beneficiaries to demonstrate continued lawful status and employment authorization.

Beneficiaries of TPS Haiti and TPS El Salvador who have been approved for re-registration currently have TPS-related documentation that will remain in effect for more than six months (until July 22, 2019, and Sept. 9, 2019, respectively). TPS Haiti and TPS El Salvador beneficiaries with pending re-registration applications, if approved, will also receive TPS-related documentation with those respective validity dates. In addition, beneficiaries of TPS Haiti and TPS El Salvador with pending re-registration applications and certain recently expired EADs have previously been issued notices of an existing automatic extension of those EADs. See TPS webpages for Haiti and El Salvador on www.uscis.gov.

Should the Court’s Order remain in effect beyond this initial extension of documentation for beneficiaries of TPS Sudan and TPS Nicaragua, DHS will issue a subsequent FRN approximately 30 days before April 2, 2019, that will automatically extend the appropriate TPS-related documentation for eligible beneficiaries granted under the designations of Sudan, Nicaragua, Haiti, and El Salvador through Jan. 2, 2020. DHS will issue similar FRNs in nine-month intervals, as necessary, to continue complying with the injunction.

If a superseding final, non-appealable judicial order should permit the terminations of TPS for some or all of these countries to take effect before the expiration of any announced extension of TPS-related documentation for eligible beneficiaries of TPS for these countries, DHS may invalidate such documentation before the end validity date stated in the current or subsequent Federal Register notices. Any such termination of TPS-related documentation would only be effective 120 days after the effective date of such a final, non-appealable order, or on the termination date of the TPS designation previously announced in the Federal Register for the relevant country before the preliminary injunction, whichever is later.

For additional information, please reference the FRN and specific TPS country pages available on the USCIS website.