US judge blocks Trump bid to strip work permits from immigrants

The order prevents thousands from El Salvador, Sudan and Ukraine from losing work authorisation while lawsuit proceeds.A United States federal judge has temporarily blocked the administration of US President Donald Trump from revoking work permits for tens of thousands of asylum seekers and immigrants with Temporary Protected Status (TPS), preventing a policy that was set to take effect as early as Wednesday.On Tuesday, US District Judge Nathaniel Gorton sided with immigrant rights groups and labour unions challenging a series of new Immigration-services" class="entity-link entity-organization" data-entity-id="1849" data-entity-type="organization">US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) policies that implement Immigration restrictions passed by Congress last year.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemslist 1 of 4US judge bars Trump from ending protected status for Yemeni nationalslist 2 of 4US Supreme Court paves way for government to block asylum seekers at borderlist 3 of 4Advocates warn of wide-ranging implications of US Supreme Court TPS rulinglist 4 of 4Will the end of TPS for Haitians mean a caregiving crisis in US?end of listIn the five-page order, he wrote, “The consequences faced by plaintiffs are potentially severe.” The order will stay in place while he considers whether to issue a longer-term injunction, with a decision expected by August 5.The lawsuit, filed earlier this month by a coalition of organisations represented by the legal group Democracy Forward, challenged a number of recent USCIS policy changes. Those include a new policy allowing the agency to reject pending asylum applications and revoke work permits if applicants don’t pay a newly created annual asylum fee, as well as its decision to scrap a decades-old rule requiring initial asylum work permit applications to be processed within 30 days. The lawsuit argued USCIS made the changes without public input, as required by law.It also challenged the retroactive application of the new rules to people from El Salvador, Sudan and Ukraine, who are still protected by TPS, which allows people from countries affected by war, natural disasters or other major crises to live and work legally in the US until it is considered safe for them to return home.