DHS 'vehemently disagrees' with judge's Haiti TPS decision, hasn't decided next step

Jacqueline Charles, Miami Herald on Feb 4, 2026

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Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Wednesday that her agency is consulting with the Justice Department on how to proceed after a federal judge halted the administration’s decision to terminate temporary protected status for Haitians in the United States.

The TPS designation, which allows more than 300,000 Haitians to legally live and work in the United States because conditions in Haiti make a safe return impossible, was set to terminate at 11:59 p.m. Eastern time Tuesday. But in an 83-page ruling issued Monday, District Court Judge Ana C. Reyes in Washington. D.C., blocked the termination, accusing Noem of failing to follow the law and showing racial animus toward Haitians.

“The Department of Homeland Security vehemently disagrees with this order and is working with Department of Justice to determine next steps,” Noem said the ruling in a post on the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services website.

Noem doubled down on her agency’s determination in November that Haiti no longer meets the statutory requirement for its TPS designation, which was granted by President Barack Obama after the country’s devastating 2010 earthquake. The decision, she said, was made “after reviewing country conditions and consulting with the appropriate U.S. government agencies.”

During President Donald Trump’s first term, when he attempted to end Haiti’s designation, the administration appealed through the federal courts. The process, slowed by the court’s dockets, allowed Haitians to remain in the U.S. for years before Haitians ultimately prevailed. But in recent months DHS has appealed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court, which has allowed the administration to continue with deportations while immigration cases are litigated in court.

Noem noted that “a single judge” decided to block the TPS termination “even though the Department of Homeland Security recently prevailed twice in the U.S. Supreme Court in a similar case.”

The administration’s announcement comes as Trump’s mass deportation efforts come under profound scrutiny amid arrests of U.S. citizens and young immigrant children, and the violent and sometimes deadly tactics federal immigration officers have been using.

It also comes amid growing concerns in some parts of the administration over Haiti’s ongoing transition, which will cross another threshold on Sunday when the mandate of a nine-member ruling presidential panel is set to end. There is still no agreement on how the country is to be governed afterwards, and concerns about armed gangs turning to violence have grown. On Tuesday, a U.S. guided-missile destroyer, the USS Stockdale arrived off the coast of Haiti in the Bay of Port-au-Prince.

Following the ship’s arrival, members of an armed gang in the Viv Ansanm coalition immediately dislodged themselves from a port along the bay, a source told the Miami Herald.

South Florida immigration advocates, while celebrating the victory in court this week, were also clear-eyed about the legal fight ahead, warning that Reyes’ decision is not the end but the beginning, even though the ruling, for now, protects families and local economies.

“For months, Haitian TPS holders and their loved ones have been living under the stress of losing everything that they have built. They have been forced to wake up every day wondering, ‘Will I still have my job tomorrow? Will I be separated from my children? Will I be sent back to a country in crisis today?’” said Alexandra Orellana, from the Florida Immigrant Coalition, a Miami-based advocacy group.

“The court recognized what our communities have always known: Unfairly stripping legal status from hundreds of thousands of Haitians who have built their lives here would have caused devastating and unnecessary harm.”

The ruling, she added, “is a step towards justice, stability and common sense, but we will not stop until justice is permanent…. We will keep demanding policies rooted in humanity, fairness and dignity, because our communities deserve nothing less.”

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