August 12, 2026
The Center Square
By Bethany Blankley
Key Takeaways
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit dismissed a lawsuit by immigration groups challenging the Trump administration’s termination of Biden-era mass parole programs and the use of expedited removal, vacating a lower-court stay.
The appellate court ruled that the district court lacked jurisdiction and that the plaintiffs lacked legal standing, finding their requested relief would not alter their members’ exposure to expedited removal under existing federal authority.
The decision allows the Trump administration to continue ending the parole programs—which had released millions of people into the United States—and to subject former parolees to expedited removal.
(The Center Square) – U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit has effectively ended a Biden-era mass parole program after it dismissed a lawsuit against the Trump administration.
The ruling is seen as a major victory for the Trump administration and for dozens of states that sued to stop parole programs created by the Biden administration that federal judges ruled were illegal but the programs continued.
Under the second Trump administration, Biden-era parole programs were terminated and expedited removal of those released into the country illegally began.
In order to stop this, several immigration groups sued led by the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights. Their lawsuit alleges a Department of Homeland Security memo and email violated the Administrative Procedure Act and Fifth Amendment Due Process Clause.
The groups won their first round in court after a district court granted a partial stay “to the extent the Challenged Actions subject to expedited removal individuals who have been, at any time, paroled into the United States at a point of entry.”
The appellate court reversed this ruling, arguing “the district court lacked jurisdiction. Therefore, we vacate the district court’s stay.”
It also clarified that “Although, we have jurisdiction over this appeal, the district court lacked jurisdiction.”
The appellate court also squashed the lawsuit altogether, ruling the plaintiffs don’t have legal standing to sue.
In its 14-page ruling, it also tore apart the plaintiffs’ arguments, stating its counterarguments “failed.”
The requests they made for a stay were also faulty, the court said. “Even if the number of expedited removals increased because of the [memo and email], that does not mean getting rid of [either] will reverse that trend,” the court ruled. “The stay the plaintiffs requested would not affect the Government’s authority to continue subjecting the plaintiffs to expedited removal” under federal law.
The court also clarified in a note to its ruling that “Parole termination is ultimately irrelevant to our analysis here. The plaintiffs do not challenge the regulation rendering ex-parolees liable to expedited removal under the arriving in authority. So whether or not parole termination has taken place, and whether or not ex-parolees are subject to expedited removal under the designation authority, the organizational plaintiffs’ members would remain equally subject to expedited removal under the arriving in authority.”
At issue is the Trump administration’s expedited removal of millions of inadmissible foreign nationals who were released into the country through more than a dozen parole programs created by the Biden administration. The U.S. House Committee on Homeland Security identified the parole programs as illegal when bringing impeachment charges against former DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, The Center Square reported.
Dozens of states sued, led by Texas and Florida, arguing the parole programs were illegal, The Center Square reported. A federal judge in Florida ruled more than once that the parole programs were illegal and expressed exasperation that they continued, The Center Square reported.
A successful appeal in this case is unlikely.
“Plaintiffs cannot seek relief that changes nothing for them. The plaintiffs here tried to do just that. So we vacate the stay issued by the district court,” the court held.
The parole programs that were terminated led to millions of foreign nationals entering the U.S. They include one created for Central American Minors, a CHNV program for Cuban, Honduran, Nicaraguan and Venezuelans and a “Family Reunification Parole Process” for Salvadorans, Guatemalans, Hondurans and Columbians.
The CHNV parole program ushered in more than three million people in three years deemed inadmissible under federal immigration law, The Center Square reported. They totaled more than the individual populations of 17 states.
Another 2.5 million Colombians, Salvadorans, Guatemalans and Hondurans were paroled through their own parole program, The Center Square reported. They totaled more than the individual populations of 15 states.
The Trump administration also terminated Biden era “Circumvention of Lawful Pathways” rule that altered the asylum process, a phone app created to expedite entry into the U.S. for inadmissible foreign nationals, among others, The Center Square reported.
Now those released into the country through the parole programs can be deported.
Haiti: Bishop Says Gangs Target Church As Violence Shuts Parishes, Schools
Street scene and poverty in Haiti. Photo Credit: UNHCR/Juan Pablo Terminello
EWTN News
By Tessa Gervasini
Key Takeaways
Bishop Joseph Gontrand Décoste of Jérémie describes the Catholic Church in Haiti as the last remaining moral, ethical and spiritual bulwark, which is why gangs are targeting it, while stressing that the Church continues to pray, hope and function amid the violence.
Gang violence has forced the closure of 40 parishes in Port-au-Prince, led to attacks on schools and religious houses, and compelled aid organizations such as Sister Paesie’s Kizito Family to shelter dozens of newly displaced or orphaned children after recent assaults that killed civilians.
U.S. bishops continue to press for extension of Temporary Protected Status for Haitian nationals, warning that returning people to Haiti would send them into a country dominated by gangs, marked by institutional collapse, and still experiencing severe insecurity and humanitarian crisis.
Bishop Joseph Gontrand Décoste of Jérémie, Haiti, detailed the ongoing violence in the nation and warned that the Church has become a target for gangs.
The Church is “the last remaining bulkhead — moral, ethical, spiritual, and prophetic,” he said. “That is why they want to eliminate us.”
Décoste told Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), an international Catholic pastoral aid organization, that despite the widespread violence in the Caribbean nation, the Church remains hopeful.
“We keep praying, singing, and dancing. In Haiti we say: ‘As long as they haven’t cut off our head, we still have hope of wearing a hat.’ That is why we never lose hope,” he said.
The bishop thanked organizations working to offer aid to the nation. He said: “Your prayers sustain us enormously; without them we could not carry on. Thank you very much from the bottom of my heart.”
Gang violence in the nation continues to rise with armed gangs controlling between 70% and 90% of the capital.
Amid the violence, in Port-au-Prince, 40 parishes have had to close, according to ACN. Schools and religious houses have also been attacked, burned, and seized.
Sister Paesie, a Catholic sister who operates an organization to aid children in Cité Soleil, Haiti, also highlighted the increasing violence.
The sister and her team at the Kizito Family, which runs homes, schools, and catechism programs, recently took in dozens more children following numerous recent attacks.
Sister Paesie told EWTN News that last week gangs attacked an area in Port-au-Prince where the organization operates one of its schools. Most of the population fled besides a few elderly people who were unable to, and most were killed.
“The parents began bringing children to us for shelter,” she told EWTN News. On Aug. 9, “we took in about 20” and “others came yesterday, and about 50 today.”
“The Missionaries of Charity accepted to take in the girls” and “we have the boys,” she said.
“Among them were four brothers [who] were alone when the attack took place. The parents had gone to work, and a cousin grabbed them and fled. When the father returned home, he was not aware of the attack. He was killed and burned. The mother did not show up … where the people took refuge,” she said.
Sister Paesie also detailed how the attacks and destruction have left organizations, many of them run by religious orders, unable to operate and provide aid to those in need.
She specifically noted a Missionaries of Charity convent that was attacked and burned down two years ago.
It remains “completely empty and the buildings destroyed,” she said. “It used to receive more than 2,000 patients every year.”
U.S. bishops urge protection for Haitian nationals on TPS
U.S. bishops have continuously warned of the unsafe conditions in Haiti, urging lawmakers to extend temporary protected status (TPS) for Haitian nationals living in the United States.
Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami has previously said that ending temporary residency protections for Haitians would be “sending people into a burning building.”
He said Haiti “remains a country on the brink,” noting the “widespread gang violence and kidnapping, a rampant cholera epidemic, and spreading food insecurity.”
“The lack of functioning state institutions has resulted in a general breakdown of security, with attacks on women and children becoming commonplace,” he said. “It would be an act of abject cruelty for the United States to send families back to such dangerous and unsafe conditions.”
Other Florida bishops, and many Ohio bishops, have also addressed the matter, calling for a more permanent solution to care for the refugees.
The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation in April, and the Senate has not acted on that measure or on a bill (S. 4814), which would require the Homeland Security secretary to designate Haiti for TPS through early 2029, giving eligible Haitian nationals in the United States protection from deportation and authorization to work while conditions in Haiti remain unsafe.
About EWTN News
EWTN News is the rebranding of the Catholic News Agency (CNA), following the decision by EWTN — which was launched as a Catholic television network in 1981 by Mother Angelica, PCPA — that brings CNA and its affiliated ACI international outlets under a single, unified identity. Previous CNA articles may be foundby clicking here.
View all posts by EWTN News →
Newleftreview.org
No comments:
Post a Comment