Employers Sort Out Workforces as Deportation Protections Vanish

US businesses are facing the termination of thousands of workers whose temporary deportation protections are being stripped by the Trump administration, as legal disputes play out over the relief granted to hundreds of thousands of immigrants.

Workers with humanitarian parole or Temporary Protected Status—many with high-demand skills—are employed across the country in industries like hospitality, construction, and health care. Corporations like the Walt Disney Co. and Walmart Inc. have reportedly sidelined some workers as a result of two US Supreme Court decisions that, for now, allow the Department of Homeland Security to revoke those protections for immigrants from countries like Venezuela, Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua.

Other employers in various industries have held off on making personnel changes until they receive clearer direction from DHS on how the agency will carry out its cancellation of the protections, attorneys say.

But they finally got clarity from US Citizenship and Immigration Services on the work eligibility of 350,000 Venezuelan TPS holders via an online update last week. The agency said it no longer considers documents like work permits for those immigrants valid, meaning businesses this week will have to begin terminating them from positions unless they can show some other form of employment authorization.

Still uncertain is the employment eligibility of another half million immigrants admitted through a Biden-era parole program for Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. DHS has provided no clear guidance on how it will carry out termination of the program since it got the go-ahead from the justices last month.

The lack of clear direction from the government has made workforce planning “incredibly chaotic,” said Helen Konrad, director of immigration practice at McCandlish Holton PC.

“Things could change in two minutes,” she said. “It’s the exact opposite of how you want any business to run.”

Verifying Work Permits

Temporary Protected Status allows immigrants to stay in the US for up to 18 months at a time with legal work authorization when conditions in their home country prevent a safe return. Parole authority allows presidents to temporarily admit immigrants for the public benefit or humanitarian reasons to apply for a longer-term status.

Both programs saw a large expansion under the Biden administration and have now been targeted for elimination by Trump officials. DHS issued terminations for a 2023 TPS designation for Venezuela and the CHNV program. The Supreme Court decisions allowed it to move ahead despite lower court orders temporarily preserving protections while legal challenges played out.

With protections gone, companies have had to assess what share of their workforce is affected. The TPS update posted by USCIS last week made that even more urgent for employees covered by that program.

Unlike other recent TPS terminations for Cameroon and Nepal, there’s no grace period provided for loss of employment authorization. While there are two TPS designations for Venezuela—another 250,000 people from the country will have valid protections and work permits until at least September—businesses should know who is affected based on the expiration dates of their work permits.

“On TPS, for employers it does give clarification,” said Dawn Lurie, senior counsel at Seyfarth Shaw LLP.

Keeping track of employment authorization dates with the TPS program was already confusing because recipients are often granted extensions not reflected on documents themselves, said Avram Morell, a partner at Pryor Cashman LLP. Whiplash over expiration dates has been fueled by recent terminations and legal challenges, he said.

The I-9 employment verification process is set up to be used by non-lawyers who are supposed to rely on information in documents provided by workers, “but information on these changes isn’t communicated directly to employers,” Morrell said. Future changes to TPS and parole should provide longer grace periods on work permits so that there is time for information to reach employers that don’t closely follow immigration policy, he said.

Parole Recipients

Employers are still in a window of uncertainty on the CHNV program. Identifying which workers will be sidelined as a result of its termination will be even more difficult than for TPS because a variety of programs could be covered by parole documentation. A worker could be paroled into the US for medical treatment, for example, or as part of a family reunification program.

Workers with parole will be notified through their online USCIS accounts if their status and work permits are revoked, DHS said in an online posting. DHS didn’t comment on whether further guidance would be coming for employers on either TPS or parole work authorization.

Businesses will be relying to a large extent on workers themselves to notify them about any changes. Immigrants could be paroled into the US for a variety of reasons and employers can run afoul of the Immigration and Nationality Act’s prohibitions on discrimination based on nationality or country of origin by demanding evidence of work authorization from certain workers based solely on where they’re from.

Companies that participate in the federal E-Verify program will likely receive some kind of notification from USCIS. But those that don’t enroll in the program or retain employees’ documentation won’t have any way of connecting them to the terminated parole process. Absent other direction from the agency, they’ll be left legally vulnerable, attorneys say.

Amy Peck, a principal attorney at Jackson Lewis PC, said the government has a responsibility to give direct policy guidance to businesses on how to respond to termination of protections.

They’re only allowed to hire legally authorized workers on the one hand, but can’t discriminate on the basis of citizenship or nationality on the other, she said.

“Employers are walking a tightrope,” she said. “The administration wants a high level of compliance but we lack clarity on how to wade through these murky waters.”