A federal judge appointed by former President Joe Biden has issued a ruling to block President Donald Trump’s administration from swiftly deporting migrants who entered the United States through Biden’s controversial parole pipeline program.
Judge Jia Cobb, serving on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, sided with plaintiffs challenging the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) plan to dismiss pending cases of parolees and place them into expedited removal. The ruling halts Trump’s efforts to dismantle a key Biden-era immigration program that brought over 530,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela into the U.S. through ports of entry under the CHNV parole system.
“These migrants were paroled into the U.S. under procedures created and advocated by the government. They played by the rules,” Cobb wrote. She further claimed that reversing course would impose “imminent, irreparable injury” on those already inside the U.S.
Cobb’s order blocks Trump’s DHS from initiating deportations of any migrant who entered under Biden’s parole system until the court reaches a final decision. DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin condemned the ruling, stating that Cobb is “flagrantly ignoring the United States Supreme Court,” referencing a 2020 7-2 decision affirming the federal government’s authority to expedite removals.
“This ruling is lawless and won’t stand,” McLaughlin said.
The Biden-era parole program has faced ongoing criticism from border security advocates who say it functionally bypassed standard immigration procedures by allowing hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals into the U.S. under the guise of humanitarian relief. President Trump’s DHS argued the program was an abuse of the executive parole authority, meant to be used sparingly and only in extraordinary circumstances.
Trump’s administration had sought to shut down the parole pipeline and fast-track the removal of those who entered under it. Judge Cobb’s decision now delays those efforts, marking yet another legal barrier to restoring enforcement-focused immigration policies.
