US judge strikes down Trump policies targeting immigrants from 39 countries

A federal judge has struck down a series of Trump administration policies that effectively barred immigrants from 39 countries from receiving decisions on applications for asylum, work permits, green cards, and citizenship. Chief U.S. District Judge John McConnell in Providence, Rhode Island, ruled Friday that the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) adopted unlawful policies that left people from numerous African, Asian, Latin American, and Middle Eastern nations in "indeterminate legal limbo."

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indeterminate legal limbo

McConnell, appointed by former President Barack Obama, stated that immigrants had followed the legal processes enacted by Congress and USCIS regulations but were left "stuck waiting, for months on end, for benefit requests that USCIS refuses to adjudicate." The judge found that USCIS adopted these policies without the necessary statutory and regulatory authority, influenced by "anti-immigrant sentiments that it is forbidden from letting influence its decision-making."

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stuck waiting, for months on end, for benefit requests that USCIS refuses to adjudicate.

"USCIS’s hold on adjudications cannot be attributed to anything that these individuals did wrong; rather, it arises solely by the happenstance of their birth," the judge wrote. The ruling is a victory for immigrant service organizations and labor unions that challenged the policies in March. Skye Perryman, head of the liberal legal group Democracy Forward, which represents the plaintiffs, stated, "This ruling reaffirms a basic principle: the federal government cannot shut down lawful immigration pathways or discriminate against people based on where they come from."

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USCIS’s hold on adjudications cannot be attributed to anything that these individuals did wrong; rather, it arises solely by the happenstance of their birth.

The Trump administration had justified the policies, implemented after the shooting of two National Guard members by an Afghan immigrant, on vetting and security grounds. The administration expanded travel bans to cover 39 nations, including Afghanistan, Iran, Haiti, Somalia, Venezuela, and Syria. USCIS placed a hold on processing immigration benefit applications from individuals from these countries, which McConnell noted "placed the lives of countless individuals on hold, solely by virtue of their countries of birth."

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This ruling reaffirms a basic principle: the federal government cannot shut down lawful immigration pathways or discriminate against people based on where they come from.