The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals — not exactly friendly territory for conservative legal victories — just handed DHS Secretary Kristi Noem a significant win in her push to end Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua.
Fox News reported that the San Francisco-based appeals court issued a stay freezing a lower court ruling that had blocked Noem's termination of TPS for the three countries. The order clears the way for the administration to move forward with ending protections that were never meant to last forever.
The panel — composed of Judges Hawkins, Callahan, and Miller — didn't mince words about where this case is headed. From the court's order:
"The government is likely to prevail in its argument that the Secretary's decision-making process in terminating TPS for Honduras, Nicaragua, and Nepal was not arbitrary and capricious."
That's the legal kill shot. The National TPS Alliance had challenged Noem's decision under the Administrative Procedure Act, arguing it was arbitrary and capricious. The Ninth Circuit looked at that argument and essentially told them: you're going to lose.
Judge Hawkins, a Clinton appointee, wrote a separate concurrence. He agreed with the result based on recent Supreme Court guidance, though he expressed reluctance to rule on the plaintiffs' claims at this early stage. When even the Clinton appointee on the panel sides with the government, the legal ground underneath the opposition is crumbling fast.
Honduras and Nicaragua received TPS protections in 1999 after Hurricane Mitch. Nepal was designated in 2015 following a massive earthquake.
Think about that for a moment. Hurricane Mitch struck over a quarter-century ago. The Nepal earthquake happened more than a decade ago. TPS was designed as a temporary shield — a pause button for people from countries experiencing disasters or conflict. The word "temporary" is right there in the name.
Yet for decades, successive administrations allowed these designations to roll forward, re-upping them again and again until "temporary" became functionally permanent. That's not compassion. That's bureaucratic inertia masquerading as policy.
Secretary Noem moved to end that cycle last year, arguing that the government must evaluate whether the original conditions justifying protection still apply. The answer, after 27 years for Honduras and Nicaragua, was obvious to anyone willing to look.
On December 31, 2025, a San Francisco district court judge sided with the plaintiffs and vacated Noem's termination order — effectively reinstating TPS protections and blocking the administration's enforcement action.
The timing was notable. A New Year's Eve ruling, landing when public attention was elsewhere, attempting to freeze the status quo in place. The Ninth Circuit's stay now reverses that maneuver and puts the administration back in the driver's seat while the appeal proceeds.
Attorney General Pam Bondi seized on the victory immediately:
"This is a crucial legal win from @TheJusticeDept attorneys that helps clear the way for President Trump's continued deportations."
Bondi also highlighted the court's own language in a follow-up statement:
"As the court found, 'the government is likely to prevail in its argument' that ending Temporary Protected Status for some immigrants is sound and lawful policy. We are proud to represent the Trump Administration in court every day."
DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin had previously noted last August that TPS protections were always intended to be temporary — a point that seems self-evident but apparently requires repeating in a political environment where every enforcement action gets treated as an emergency.
This ruling matters beyond the three countries involved. For years, TPS has functioned as a backdoor to indefinite residency — not because the law was written that way, but because no administration had the political will to enforce its actual terms.
Every renewal pushed the designated populations further from "temporary" and closer to a permanent status that Congress never authorized.
The legal challenge from the National TPS Alliance rested on the idea that ending these protections was arbitrary. But what's truly arbitrary is a system that grants "temporary" status for a natural disaster and then maintains it for a generation without ever reassessing the underlying conditions. The Ninth Circuit panel saw through that framing.
The judges on this panel — appointed by Clinton, Bush, and Trump, respectively — arrived at the same destination. That kind of cross-ideological agreement on an immigration enforcement question is rare, and it signals that the legal foundation for the administration's position is solid.
The appeal will proceed, and the full merits will eventually be litigated. But the trajectory is clear. When even the Ninth Circuit tells you the government is "likely to prevail," the word "temporary" might finally mean what it says.
