Judge Allows Trump Administration to Strip TPS From Nearly 1,100 Somalis
- Edited by: Sagar Kar
- Updated Aug 15, 2026, 23:32 IST
A federal judge has cleared the way for the Trump administration to end Temporary Protected Status for nearly 1,100 Somalis, following a Supreme Court ruling that limited judicial review of similar terminations.
People protesting in favour of TPS.
Nearly 1,100 Somalis living in the United States could soon lose their legal protection from deportation after a federal judge ruled Friday that the Trump administration can move forward with ending the program that has shielded them.
US District Judge Allison Burroughs, based in Boston, gave the Department of Homeland Security the go ahead to terminate Temporary Protected Status for Somalia. The decision follows a Supreme Court ruling in June that allowed the administration to end similar protections for thousands of people from Haiti and Syria.
That Supreme Court decision, backed by its conservative majority in a 6 to 3 vote, limited how much power judges have to review DHS actions aimed at ending TPS designations. The program had provided humanitarian protection to eligible migrants from 13 different countries.
Part of a Broader Pattern
Somalia is not the only country affected by this shift. Last week, two other judges allowed the administration to end TPS for South Sudan and Myanmar in similar fashion. At this point, Ethiopia remains the only country where a judge has managed to keep the protections blocked.
How the Case Against Somalia Unfolded
The push to end TPS for Somalis began in January, when former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced plans to terminate the designation. She argued that conditions inside Somalia had improved enough to justify the change, even though fighting between Somali government forces and al-Shabaab militants has continued.
Judge Burroughs, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, initially blocked Noem’s decision from going into effect back in March. That ruling came in response to a lawsuit filed by four Somali nationals along with two advocacy groups, including African Communities Together.
The plaintiffs in that case argued that the administration’s real motivation was bias against non-white immigrants, pointing specifically to past comments from Trump describing Somalis as “garbage” and “low IQ people.”
What Happens Next
After the Supreme Court issued its ruling in June, Burroughs responded with a new order that kept the end of Somalis’ TPS temporarily on hold while she weighed whether the plaintiffs could still pursue their case on grounds the Supreme Court’s decision hadn’t directly addressed. Friday’s ruling now clears that final obstacle, allowing DHS to move forward with terminating the protections.
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Sagar is a journalist with an interest primarily in geopolitics and American domestic politics. Before joining Times Now, he wrote for Republic and Sw… View More
Original source: https://www.timesnownews.com/world
