Judge Lets the TPS Work-Permit Cap Stand: What Expired, What Employers Need, and How to Request an Expedite

No. This is an Administrative Procedure Act case against federal agencies, not a class action settlement. No class was certified, there is no fund, no claim form, and no payment. The plaintiffs are membership organizations suing on behalf of their members, and the only relief so far is a stay of one agency policy.

No. The order resolves a preliminary motion, not the merits. The plaintiffs filed a notice of appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit on August 6, 2026, and the district court clerk was directed to deliver the record to the Court of Appeals by August 26, 2026. The stay of the asylum-fee consequences remains in place until the district court rules on the merits.

Yes. Ukraine's current designation runs through October 19, 2026 under the 18-month extension USCIS announced on January 17, 2025, covering April 20, 2025 through October 19, 2026. The designation is what protects beneficiaries from removal, and it is separate from the work permit dispute in this case. The Supreme Court's June 2026 decision in Mullin v. Doe concerned countries whose designations DHS moved to terminate, such as Haiti and Syria, and did not end Ukraine's designation.

Effectively, yes. Under 8 U.S.C. § 1254a(b)(3), the Secretary of Homeland Security must review conditions in a designated country and determine whether the designation still qualifies at least 60 days before it expires. Counting back 60 days from October 19, 2026 puts that point around August 20, 2026. The determination is published in the Federal Register.

The designation does not lapse. Under 8 U.S.C. § 1254a(b)(3)(C), if the Secretary does not make the required determination in time, the designation is automatically extended for six months, or for 12 or 18 months at the Secretary's discretion. The extension happens by operation of law. Note that it extends the designation, not any particular work permit, so it does not by itself reissue an EAD or restore a capped automatic extension.

For some people, yes. The January 17, 2025 Federal Register notices gave a one-year automatic extension to EADs that were expiring, which for Ukrainian and Sudanese EADs bearing an April 19, 2025 expiration date ran through April 19, 2026. Anyone who relied only on that automatic extension, without filing a Form I-765 renewal, has had no documented work authorization since mid-April 2026. This one-year automatic extension is a different thing from the 18-month extension of the TPS designation itself, which runs to October 19, 2026.

July 22, 2026 is the cap date USCIS applies to remaining automatic EAD extensions — one year after its July 22, 2025 Federal Register Notice implementing H.R. 1. Under the March 2026 Update, USCIS takes the position that an automatic extension cannot run past that date even where a Form I-797C receipt notice states a longer 540-day period on its face. For Ukrainian and Sudanese TPS holders the 540-day period would otherwise have run to October 11, 2026, and for Salvadoran holders to August 31, 2026.

Because that is the day the court declined to disturb the cap. It is worth correcting a common misstatement: no earlier stay of the EAD cap expired on August 5. Judge Gorton ruled that day on the plaintiffs' motion to stay agency action under 5 U.S.C. § 705, allowing it only as to the annual asylum fee penalties and denying it as to the one-year cap and the March 2026 Update. That left USCIS's treatment of capped extensions for Ukraine, El Salvador, and Sudan in place. The order also was not a ruling on a permanent injunction, and it did not decide the merits.

The court allowed the plaintiffs' motion in part and denied it in part. It stayed the consequences USCIS created for failing to pay the annual asylum fee — rejection of a pending asylum application and referral to removal proceedings — until it issues a final ruling on the merits, and held that stay is not limited to the plaintiffs. It denied a stay of the one-year cap on TPS employment authorization, of the March 2026 Update applying that cap to previously issued 540-day extensions, and of the removal of the 30-day deadline for processing initial asylum-based work permit applications.

On notice and comment, it found USCIS had good cause to skip it because the cap language closely restates H.R. 1 itself, so the agency had no choice but to effectuate the statute. On retroactivity, it found the cap does not revoke a substantive right but limits its duration, and wrote that applicants for an employment authorization document have no legitimate expectation in the duration of such an authorization. On the argument that the cap conflicts with the TPS statute's guarantee of work authorization throughout the protected period, the court said it was unconvinced by the government's reading of that statute but held that the possibility of a gap does not make the cap itself unlawful.

Not directly, but it changes what happens if DHS acts. In that June 25, 2026 decision the Court held 6-3 that the TPS statute bars federal courts from reviewing most non-constitutional challenges to a decision to end a country's designation. That lifted lower-court orders pausing terminations for Haiti and Syria. It did not terminate Ukraine's designation. What it does mean is that if DHS terminates Ukraine's designation at or before the October 19, 2026 expiration, the room to challenge that decision in court is considerably narrower than it was previously.

H.R. 1, signed July 4, 2025, provides that any employment authorization for a person granted TPS, and any renewal or extension of it, is valid for one year or for the duration of the TPS designation, whichever is shorter. USCIS treats that as displacing the longer automatic extension periods it previously granted. Separately, USCIS ended 540-day automatic extensions altogether for renewal applications filed on or after October 30, 2025.

It depends on whether an automatic extension still covers you, and USCIS's current position is that any such extension is capped. Historically an expired EAD plus a Form I-797C receipt notice for a timely renewal established continued authorization for the stated extension period. Under the March 2026 Update USCIS says that period cannot run past the cap date regardless of what the receipt says, and the court declined to stay that reading. Check the current expiration date on your USCIS online account rather than relying on the date printed on an older receipt notice.

At reverification you present an unexpired document from List A or List C, and you choose which one. An unexpired EAD is a List A document. An unrestricted Social Security card is a List C document and is acceptable on its own at reverification — it does not need to be paired with a photo ID the way it would during an initial Section 2 verification. Your employer must not reverify List B identity documents and must not demand a specific document from you.

Federal law restricts continuing to employ someone who cannot document current work authorization, so an employer facing a lapse does have a real compliance problem. But the employer must first reverify properly on Form I-9 Supplement B, must let the employee choose any acceptable List A or List C document, must give a reasonable opportunity to present one, and must apply the same process to everyone whose documents are expiring. Singling out workers by nationality or citizenship status can constitute an unfair immigration-related employment practice under 8 U.S.C. § 1324b. How and when to act on a specific lapse is a question for the employer's counsel.

E-Verify does generate alerts to participating employers when work authorization documents are expiring, and USCIS pushed the March 2026 Update language to employers through E-Verify directly. But an alert is only a reminder to reverify on the paper Form I-9. Employers may not use E-Verify to reverify an employee and should not create a new E-Verify case for a current employee whose authorization is expiring — reverification is recorded on Supplement B of the Form I-9.

Losing the ability to document work authorization does not by itself end TPS. TPS status and the work permit are separate, with separate expiration dates, and the August 5 ruling addressed the work permit side. Ukraine's designation remains in effect through October 19, 2026 absent DHS action. Anyone unsure how a lapse affects their particular case should speak with an immigration attorney rather than rely on a general explanation.

USCIS accepts expedite requests at no fee, entirely at its discretion, decided case by case and generally requiring documentation. The published criteria are severe financial loss to a company or person, emergencies and urgent humanitarian situations, IRS-designated nonprofits acting in the cultural or social interests of the United States, U.S. government interests, and clear USCIS error. Needing a work permit in order to work is not on its own a basis, and USCIS excludes urgency caused by the applicant's own late filing or failure to respond to a request for evidence. Requests are submitted through a USCIS online account, through the USCIS Contact Center, or via a congressional constituent-services office.

They are different pathways with different documents. TPS-based EADs carry category code A12 or C19, while parole-based EADs carry category C11, and eligibility, filing requirements, and processing all differ. Parole programs for Ukrainians have been subject to pauses and changes, so whether any parole route is currently available and appropriate is a case-specific question for an immigration attorney. This page does not assess eligibility for any alternative pathway.

A termination does not by itself confer or remove any other immigration status. Whether a person has another basis to remain — an independent application, a family or employment pathway, or another form of protection — depends entirely on individual facts, and some options carry their own deadlines that can be missed while waiting. Because Mullin v. Doe narrowed judicial review of termination decisions, litigation is a less reliable backstop than it once was. Anyone in this position should get individualized advice well before the designation's end date rather than after.