Venezuelan TPS Paused as Ninth Circuit Grants 14-Day Stay

The Ninth Circuit has paused the order that would have restored Venezuelan TPS on Nov. 6, four days after refusing to do so, buying the government time to go back to the Supreme Court.

Venezuelan TPS will not return on Nov. 6 as scheduled, at least for now. The Ninth Circuit on Tuesday granted the Trump administration an administrative stay that temporarily pauses the district court order reinstating Temporary Protected Status for Venezuelans, reversing its own Oct. 30 refusal, Law360 and Bloomberg Law reported. According to Bloomberg Law, the three-judge panel said it will grant a 14-day administrative stay beginning Friday, the same day the Supreme Court’s earlier stay of the case expires.

The reversal matters because the timing was the whole story. When the panel denied the government’s stay request on Oct. 30, Venezuelans who lost TPS in 2025 were days away from regaining protection from deportation and eligibility to work. A pause starting Nov. 6 would run to about Nov. 20, a date calculated from Bloomberg Law’s description, and gives the Solicitor General a window to seek longer relief from the justices before anyone’s status changes.

Case: National TPS Alliance v. Mullin, No. 25-5724, an appeal of U.S. District Judge Edward Chen’s Sept. 5, 2025 ruling that then-Secretary Kristi Noem exceeded her authority in ending Venezuela’s TPS.
What the panel refused on Oct. 30: a stay pending appeal and, as a fallback, an administrative stay of at least 21 days, both in a short order that gave no reasons.
What it granted Tuesday: a shorter administrative stay of 14 days beginning Friday, according to Bloomberg Law. Law360 confirmed the stay but its public text did not give the length.
Who is affected: DHS’s February 2025 termination notice counted 348,202 people registered under the 2023 designation alone; plaintiffs describe the total affected as hundreds of thousands.

Why an administrative stay is not a ruling

An administrative stay is a holding pattern. Courts use it to freeze the status quo while they, or a higher court, consider a request more carefully. It says nothing about who will win the appeal, and the public reporting does not explain why the panel changed course after rejecting a longer version of the same relief four days earlier. The most plausible reading is procedural: a short pause lets the Supreme Court weigh an emergency application without Venezuelans gaining status on Nov. 6 and potentially losing it again weeks later.

If the government goes to the justices, it brings a stronger hand than in 2025. In Mullin v. Doe, decided 6-3 on June 25, 2026, the Court held that the TPS statute bars judicial review of non-constitutional challenges to the Secretary’s designation, extension and termination decisions, and on Oct. 5 it sent this case back to the Ninth Circuit to be reconsidered in light of that ruling. The administration has argued that Mullin stripped the courts of jurisdiction over the case entirely, according to the ACLU of Northern California’s account of the briefing. The plaintiffs answer that courts can still decide whether the Secretary’s Venezuela orders went beyond what the statute allows. The Supreme Court has sided with the government at both earlier emergency stages of this litigation.

What the pause means for Venezuelan workers and employers

For now, nothing changes on Friday. Venezuelans whose TPS was terminated remain without TPS-based status or work authorization while the stay is in effect, and employers have no new Form I-9 action to take until DHS or USCIS publishes implementation guidance, which in past rounds of TPS litigation has come through notices on the USCIS website. The people with the most at stake are former holders who had planned around Nov. 6 as the day their status and work permits would come back.

The plaintiffs frame the case in stark terms. Jessica Bansal, TPS counsel for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, said in an Oct. 30 statement released by the ACLU of Northern California that the termination “stripped over half a million refugees of lawful immigration status.” The government’s position is that Congress gave the Secretary these decisions and kept courts out of them. Venezuela remains one of the largest tests of that question after a year in which 13 of 17 TPS countries were terminated, a trend also reflected in DHS’s 2.2 million enforcement-action tally.

Dates to watch

Nov. 6: the Supreme Court’s stay expires and the Ninth Circuit’s 14-day administrative stay begins, per Bloomberg Law.
Before about Nov. 20: any emergency application by the government to the Supreme Court, or further action by the panel.
Merits appeal: the Ninth Circuit said on Oct. 30 it would set an expedited briefing schedule by separate order.

This article is for general information and is not legal advice.

Sources

Vasanth Vaidyanathan, Esq.

Administrator

Vasanth Vaidyanathan is an immigration attorney with over 20 years of experience focused exclusively on U.S. immigration and nationality law. He holds an LL.M. from California Western School of Law, San Diego and advises individuals and businesses on employment and family-based immigration matters, including H-1B, PERM, EB categories, and adjustment of status. He has also been a featured speaker at immigration seminars across the U.S. To reach Vasanth visit: https://www.vnathan.com/

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