Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) filed articles of impeachment Monday against U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs, accusing the Obama appointee of defying a Supreme Court ruling to block the Trump administration from ending Temporary Protected Status for Somali nationals.
Burroughs, who sits on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, issued a stay Friday that temporarily halted the administration’s move to end TPS for Somalis. The order came in an ongoing lawsuit filed by African Communities Together, which argues the termination was based on racially discriminatory grounds.
“In issuing this stay, Judge Burroughs attempted to get around the Supreme Court’s ruling in Mullin v. Doe by entertaining spurious allegations of racial and national-origin discrimination against an Administration that has chosen to not renew a single temporary protected status designation,” Ogles wrote in his impeachment resolution, first obtained by Fox News Digital.
“This judicial activist’s obstruction of the people’s will must be stopped,” Ogles told the outlet. “Judge Burroughs must be impeached.”
The Supreme Court ruled in June that significantly limited the ability of lower courts to block TPS terminations. Burroughs’ latest stay is based on an amended complaint from the plaintiffs that attempts to work around that ruling.
Department of Homeland Security General Counsel James Percival posted on X Friday that “there is no serious debate about what is going on in these cases: defiance, obstruction, and delay.”
TPS is a humanitarian program that grants safe harbor in the United States to people who fled natural disasters or war in their home countries. Burroughs was appointed to the federal bench in 2014 by then-President Barack Obama.
Ogles’ resolution is one of several impeachment efforts Trump allies in Congress have filed against federal judges during the president’s second term. A prior push to impeach U.S. District Judge James Boasberg fell flat last year after senior House Republicans said impeachment wasn’t the most effective tool to rein in judges they call “rogue.” Conservatives have since revived the campaign to target what they describe as activist judges.
The impeachment threat comes as the Trump administration presses its broader effort to wind down TPS designations nationwide. The Supreme Court is also weighing a related case over the administration’s bid to terminate protections for Haitian and Syrian migrants.
