US ends temporary legal status for Ethiopians amid Trump crackdown

The US is ending temporary legal status for citizens of Ethiopia in the United States, according to a government notice on Friday, as the Trump administration continues its crackdown on legal and illegal immigration.

“After reviewing country conditions and consulting with appropriate US government agencies, the secretary determined that Ethiopia no longer continues to meet the conditions for the designation for Temporary Protected Status,” homeland security secretary Kristi Noem said in a notice posted in the Federal Register.

Temporary protected status is available to people whose home country has experienced a natural disaster, armed conflict or other extraordinary event. It provides eligible migrants with work authorization and temporary protection from deportation.

The program was created in 1991, and under Donald Trump’s predecessor, Joe Biden, it was extended to cover about 600,000 Venezuelans and 521,000 Haitians. Noem reversed the extensions in February, saying they were no longer justified.

In recent months, the Trump administration has removed the protective status for people from numerous countries, including Haiti, Myanmar, South Sudan, Syria and Venezuela. In November, the president announced the termination of protection for Somalis in Minnesota.

Trump has made controlling immigration a central plank of his second White House term. Canceling TPS protections are a boost to the administration’s campaign to deport millions of people. The cancellations have been challenged in court.

The US supreme court in October cleared the way for the administration to revoke TPS for hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan people in the United States, granting a request to put on hold a federal judge’s ruling that Noem lacked the authority to terminate the status while litigation proceeds.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) also said on Friday it was no longer processing legacy cases under the Cuban and Haitian family reunification parole program, according to a post in the Federal Register. Those programs make it easier for US citizens and lawful permanent residents to bring family members into the country.