WASHINGTON – A unanimous Supreme Court curbed a 30-year-old immigration program for foreign nationals whose countries are ravaged by war or natural disaster, ruling its temporary protection from deportation doesn’t guarantee a more permanent stay.
Some 400,000 people, most from El Salvador, live in the U.S. with Temporary Protected Status, which permits them to remain as long as the government determines they cannot safely return. At issue in the case was whether those immigrants could apply for lawful permanent residency, or green cards, if they entered the United States illegally.
Federal law requires immigrants seeking green cards to have been “inspected and admitted or paroled into the United States.” A New Jersey couple from El Salvador who lived in the U.S. for two decades argued they met that mandate when they become TPS recipients. Both the Trump and Biden administrations disagreed.
The court also found the argument unpersuasive.
The TPS beneficiary in the case “was not lawfully admitted, and his TPS does not alter that fact,” Associate Justice Elena Kagan wrote for the court. “He therefore cannot become a permanent resident of this country.”
During arguments in April, the court’s conservative majority appeared skeptical of the immigrants’ claim. Critics of TPS say the program is intended to provide temporary relief, not permanent residence.
Earlier:Supreme Court to debate immigration case as Biden wrestles with border crisis
Earlier:Supreme Court pushes back…
