TPS Terminations Are Coming Fast: What Employers Need to Know Right Now

If you feel like you need a law degree and a crystal ball just to fill out Form I-9 these days, you’re not wrong — and you’re not alone. Temporary Protected Status (TPS) has become one of the most volatile corners of immigration law in 2026, with the Supreme Court, multiple federal district courts, and the Department of Homeland Security all pulling in different directions on the same week sometimes. On June 25, 2026, the Supreme Court decided Mullin v. Doe, ruling that most legal challenges to TPS terminations can’t even be heard in court, which effectively handed DHS a green light to move fast on ending protections for hundreds of thousands of people. Since then, the dominoes have been falling — but not all at once, and not evenly, because a patchwork of district court stays is still (for now) keeping some EADs alive.

This post breaks down, country by country, what’s actually happening on the ground for employers as of July 24, 2026 — not the political noise, just the practical rules you need to follow to stay compliant.

The Big Picture: Why This Is So Messy Right Now

Here’s the state of play in a nutshell:

DHS has moved to terminate TPS for Ethiopia, Yemen, Burma, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria, Haiti, and Venezuela, each through its own Federal Register notice.
Federal courts stepped in for most of these countries, issuing stays that (temporarily) kept work authorization alive while litigation played out.
Then came Mullin v. Doe. The Supreme Court held that Congress largely stripped courts of the power to second-guess DHS’s TPS decisions, which knocked out the main legal theory (the “arbitrary and capricious” argument under the Administrative Procedure Act) that had been blocking terminations for Burma, Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan, Yemen, and others.
The lower courts haven’t all caught up yet. So right now, EADs for several of these countries are in a kind of legal purgatory — technically terminated, but still valid on paper because a district court order hasn’t been lifted.
And the volatility isn’t limited to our eight focus countries. On July 21, 2026, a federal court in Massachusetts temporarily blocked a separate USCIS policy — tied to the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” — that would have cut short certain TPS holders’ 540-day automatic work authorization extensions effective July 22, 2026. That order (in Venezuelan Association of Massachusetts v. USCIS) mainly affects TPS holders from Ukraine, El Salvador, and Sudan, but it’s a fresh reminder that this landscape can shift overnight, even outside the eight countries covered in detail below.

Translation for HR: don’t assume anything is settled. What’s true today may not be true in ten days. Bookmark the USCIS TPS page, check it religiously, and don’t get comfortable.

Question 1: Can I Hire a TPS Holder Right Now?

Yes — as long as their EAD is currently valid or covered by an active extension. A TPS-based work permit that hasn’t expired (or has been extended by a Federal Register notice or court order) is a perfectly acceptable List A document for Form I-9 purposes.

A few ground rules:

Don’t refuse to hire someone just because their EAD shows a TPS category code (A12 or C19). That’s national-origin and citizenship-status discrimination waiting to happen, and the USCIS Handbook for Employers guidance on avoiding discrimination makes clear the DOJ’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section takes that seriously.
Check the actual expiration date — including any extended date from a court order or Federal Register notice — before assuming the document is stale.
Don’t demand extra documentation just because you know (or suspect) someone holds TPS. If the EAD is facially valid, treat it like any other valid List A document.

Question 2: Can I Keep My Current TPS Employees on Staff?

In most cases, yes — for now. Here’s the framework:

If the employee’s EAD is still within its printed or extended validity period, they remain authorized to work, full stop.
If a court order or Federal Register notice extended the EAD, that extension is legally binding until it’s undone — even if the underlying TPS designation has technically been “terminated” by DHS.
Don’t jump the gun. Several employers got burned earlier this year assuming an EAD had expired on a date DHS announced, only to have USCIS quietly push the date back days later. As one firm bluntly put it, don’t reverify before the current, operative expiration date — not the date you think should apply.

Question 3: When Do I Actually Have to Terminate a TPS Employee?

This is where things get real, and where you need to move carefully:

Reverification is required when the employee’s work authorization documentation actually expires — not before, and not based on rumors or headlines.
At reverification, the employee must present new, unexpired evidence of continued work authorization, following the USCIS handbook section on automatic extensions of employment authorization. An expired TPS-based EAD, once truly expired, doesn’t count.
If the employee can’t produce valid proof of continued authorization, federal law (INA § 274A) generally doesn’t let you keep them employed — continuing to do so can expose your company to liability.
Before you fire anyone, check whether they have another basis for work authorization. Plenty of TPS holders also have pending asylum applications, green card processes, or other status entirely independent of TPS. Don’t assume TPS is their only lifeline.
Apply the process consistently. If you’re reverifying TPS-based EADs from one country but not another, or treating similarly situated employees differently, you’re inviting a national-origin discrimination claim under INA § 274B.
Talk to immigration counsel before any adverse action. Given how fast this area is shifting, a termination that looked legally required on a Tuesday might look premature — or even discriminatory — by Friday.

Question 4: Documentation and Form I-9 Mechanics

The government’s own instructions have been refreshingly (if confusingly) specific here. For most of the countries still under active litigation, USCIS is telling employers to do the following on Form I-9:

In Section 1, enter “as per court order” for the expiration date field.
In Section 2, enter the current court-ordered extension date (these vary by country — see the table below) along with a note in the Additional Information box.
For E-Verify cases, use that same extended date.
Do not reverify using E-Verify — reverification always happens on paper, via Supplement B of Form I-9.
Employers may (but aren’t required to) attach the USCIS country-specific alert to the employee’s Form I-9 as supporting documentation.
Keep monitoring — these dates have moved multiple times already in 2026 (some countries had three different “release” updates between July 1 and July 17 alone).

Country-by-Country Snapshot (As of Late July 2026)

Country	Termination Status	Court Stay?	Current EAD Extension Date for I-9/E-Verify
Haiti ( USCIS update )	Terminated Nov. 28, 2025; slated to end Feb. 3, 2026	Yes — D.D.C. stay, but Mullin cleared the way for termination to proceed	July 24, 2026, per the July 10 release, pending lower court alignment with Mullin
Syria	Terminated Sept. 22, 2025; slated to end Nov. 21, 2025	Yes — S.D.N.Y. stay, but Mullin cleared the way for termination	July 24, 2026, per the July 17 release
Ethiopia	Terminated Dec. 15, 2025; slated to end Feb. 13, 2026	Yes — D. Mass. stay, still in effect as of July 17 release	July 30, 2026, per the July 17 release
Yemen ( USCIS Yemen TPS page )	Terminated March 3, 2026; slated to end May 4, 2026	Yes — S.D.N.Y. stay, still in effect as of July 17 release	July 24, 2026, per the July 17 release
Burma	Terminated Nov. 25, 2025; slated to end Jan. 26, 2026	Yes — N.D. Ill. stay, still in effect as of July 17 release	July 27, 2026, per the July 17 release
Somalia	Terminated Jan. 14, 2026; slated to end March 17, 2026	Yes — D. Mass. stay, still in effect as of July 17 release	July 24, 2026, per the July 17 release
South Sudan	Terminated Nov. 6, 2025; slated to end Jan. 5, 2026	Yes — D. Mass. stay, still in effect as of July 17 release	July 30, 2026, per the July 17 release
Venezuela ( USCIS Venezuela TPS page )	2021 designation terminated effective Nov. 7, 2025; 2023 designation termination allowed to take immediate effect by SCOTUS on Oct. 3, 2025	No general stay remains — but a narrow N.D. Cal. order preserves work authorization for a defined subset	October 2, 2026, but only for employees whose qualifying EAD/I-797/I-94 showed that expiration date and was issued on or before Feb. 5, 2025 — everyone else’s authorization has likely already lapsed

A quick but important caveat on all of the extension dates above: every single one of them is a moving target. Several countries got three different “release” updates in July alone as courts and USCIS traded punches, and as of July 24, 2026, no newer country-specific update has superseded the July 17 releases for Ethiopia, Yemen, Burma, Somalia, South Sudan, or Syria, or the July 10 release for Haiti. Treat every date in this table as “true as of the source cited” and verify against the current USCIS TPS page before acting.

A Word on Venezuela — It’s Its Own Beast

Venezuela deserves special mention because its situation is more tangled than the rest. There are two separate TPS designations (2021 and 2023) with different termination dates and different litigation histories, and both have already been terminated. Practically, that breaks Venezuelan TPS employees into three buckets:

Category 1 — Protected through October 2, 2026: They received a qualifying EAD, I-797, or I-94 showing that expiration date, issued on or before February 5, 2025.
Category 2 — Possible 540-day auto-extension: They filed a timely EAD renewal with a receipt notice dated before February 6, 2025; whether the extension applies depends on the original card’s expiration date.
Category 3 — Authorization has lapsed: Everyone else. These employees are not authorized to work based on TPS alone, though they may have another basis for authorization worth checking before any action is taken.

Given how easily these categories can be confused (and how badly you don’t want to get this wrong), Venezuelan TPS cases are prime candidates for a quick call to counsel before you do anything on the I-9 front.

A Quick Note on the Litigation (Kept Brief, As Promised)

We won’t drag you through the whole legal saga, but here’s the headline: in Mullin v. Doe, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the TPS statute largely bars courts from reviewing DHS’s decisions to end a country’s designation, reversing lower court rulings that had found the Haiti termination was tainted by improper motives. That ruling didn’t instantly end TPS for every affected employee — it removed the primary legal shield that had been keeping several terminations on ice, and courts are now working through what that means case by case. Advocacy groups have been vocal that the human stakes are enormous — healthcare industry groups, for example, have flagged that thousands of Haitian nurses and home health aides could lose their jobs as this plays out. Whatever your view of the policy, the operational reality for HR is the same: the rules are actively in motion, and yesterday’s guidance might already be outdated.

Practical Takeaways

Check, don’t guess. Before taking any action — hiring, reverifying, or terminating — look up the current USCIS guidance for that specific country. Dates have changed multiple times per month this year.
Never reverify early. Wait until the actual, currently operative expiration date. Reverifying too soon (or demanding extra paperwork because someone is a TPS holder) risks a discrimination claim under INA § 274B.
Use the “as per court order” convention for Section 1 and the current extension date in Section 2 for countries still under active stays (currently Ethiopia, Yemen, Burma, Somalia, and South Sudan).
Treat Haiti and Syria as accelerated cases — Mullin cleared the path for their terminations to move forward, even though a residual court order is still technically extending some EADs as of the source releases reviewed here.
Handle Venezuela separately and carefully — sort employees into the three categories above before making any I-9 decision, and don’t assume October 2, 2026 applies to everyone.
Apply your process uniformly. Whatever reverification standard you apply to one TPS-based EAD, apply the same standard across the board, regardless of the employee’s country of origin.
Confirm alternate work authorization before terminating. Many TPS holders have another immigration status or pending application that independently authorizes their employment.
Loop in immigration counsel before taking adverse action based on TPS status — this is not the year to wing it.
Watch the broader TPS litigation, too, not just your eight focus countries. The July 21, 2026 order blocking OBBBA-related EAD cutoffs for Ukraine, El Salvador, and Sudan is a good reminder that new court rulings can pop up fast and touch employee populations you weren’t already tracking.
Subscribe to USCIS/E-Verify alerts so you’re not relying on secondhand news to catch the next update — sign up through E-Verify Alerts or keep the USCIS TPS page bookmarked.

This area will keep shifting, probably for the rest of the year. The safest posture for HR teams right now is a mix of vigilance and humility: verify every date against the current source before you act, and resist the urge to treat any single week’s headlines as the final word.