Trump administration cannot nix legal status of 5,000 Ethiopians, US judge rules

By Nate Raymond

BOSTON, April 8 (Reuters) – A federal judge on Wednesday halted a move by U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration to end legal protections granted to over 5,000 Ethiopians that have allowed them to live and work in the United States.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy in Boston marked the latest legal setback for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s efforts to terminate the Temporary Protected Status designation for 13 countries in furtherance of Trump’s hardline immigration agenda.

TPS under federal law is available to people whose home countries have experienced natural disasters, armed conflicts or other extraordinary events. It provides eligible migrants with work authorization and temporary protection from deportation.

TRUMP ORDER SIGNALS PREORDAINED DECISIONS: JUDGE

Murphy, who was appointed by Democratic former President Joe Biden, called the termination of TPS for Ethiopia unsurprising in light of an executive order Trump signed upon returning to office in January 2025 that directed DHS to ensure such designations were “appropriately limited in scope.”

The judge said that directive from Trump “signals that the outcome of designation, extension, and termination decisions will be preordained, rather than based on a meaningful review of in-country conditions.”

He concluded that DHS disregarded the statutory procedures Congress enacted that govern TPS and provided a “pretextual” rationale for ending protections granted to people from Ethiopia, where “armed conflict and natural disasters continue to create dangerous conditions.”

“Fundamental to this case—and indeed to our constitutional system—is the principle that the will of the President does not supersede that of Congress,” Murphy wrote. “Presidential whims do not and cannot supplant agencies’ statutory obligations.”

DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Murphy ruled as the U.S. Supreme Court prepares to hear arguments on April 29 over whether the administration can revoke such temporary legal protections ​for more than 350,000 Haitians and about 6,100 Syrians living in the U.S.

Murphy issued a temporary order on January 30, preventing the protections granted to Ethiopians from ending on February 13 as scheduled, to allow the parties time for him to hear the case.

The Biden administration first granted Ethiopians already in the United States that status beginning in 2022, citing the need to protect the African nation’s citizens from armed conflict and humanitarian suffering. The status was extended again in April 2024.

DHS under former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced in December it would end TPS for Ethiopia on the grounds that conditions in the African nation no longer posed a serious threat to people returning safely.

The department has repeatedly under Trump said TPS was “never meant to be a ticket to permanent residency.”

Three Ethiopian nationals and the group African Communities Together sued, arguing the administration ignored how dangerous conditions persist in Ethiopia, where armed conflict continues in multiple regions.

The plaintiffs argued the administration’s stated rationale for its action was a pretext and not its true motivation for ending TPS, which they said was based on an unconstitutional animus against non-white immigrants. Ethiopia’s population is predominantly Black.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston, Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi, Nia Williams, Rod Nickel)