Tipsheet

Here Are the Radical Leftist Judges Who Said Trump Cannot End TPS for 350,000 Haitians

Amy Curtis
Amy Curtis  |  March 10, 2026 10:55 AM

On March 7, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that President Trump cannot revoke the temporary protected status (TPS) of 350,000 Haitians. The three-judge panel ruled 2-1 that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) could not revoke TPS and deport those Haitians back to their home country.

Here's more from Reuters:

A divided U.S. appeals court has refused to let the Trump administration revoke legal protections that allow more than 350,000 Haitians to live and work in the U.S., and avoid being returned to their gang-violence-stricken country.

A ‌2-1 panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit late on Friday rejected, opens new tab the administration's bid to pause a February 2 ruling that blocked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from ending Haiti's Temporary Protected Status.

But U.S. Circuit Judges Florence Pan and Brad Garcia, both appointed by Democratic President Joe Biden, distinguished the cases and said Haitians sent home would "be vulnerable to violence amid a 'collapsing rule of law' and lack access to life-sustaining medical care."

U.S. Circuit Judge Justin Walker, a Trump appointee, ⁠dissented, saying the case and the earlier Supreme Court litigation involving Venezuelans were "the legal equivalent of fraternal, if not identical, twins."

A DHS spokesperson said in a statement that the administration would take the case to the U.S. ⁠Supreme Court.

This is yet another case of judicial activism, and both Judge Garcia and Judge Pan have deep ties to the Biden administration and the Democratic Party.

Judge Bradley Garcia's bona fides as a radical Left judge are solid. According to his Senate Judiciary questionnaire, he attended Harvard Law School and volunteered on Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, reportedly advising the campaign on potential election challenges and possible members of a Clinton Administration. In 2021, he recieved an "Impact on the Courts Award" from the National Immigration Project" and he participated in two separate panels titled "Appealing for Change: Diversifying the Appellate Bar" and "Diversity in the Judiciary." 

He is a registered Democrat, according to the Maryland State Board of Elections, and he has donated over $1,000 to Democrats, including to the Biden for President/Biden Action Fund. He was nominated by Joe Biden to be the first Latino to serve on the federal appeals court in D.C. and worked in the Biden Justice Department.

In 2019, Garcia worked as a lawyer for the team that challenged President Trump's border wall. He was on the panel that blocked President Trump's bid to fire Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, and a panel that upheld the gag order placed on President Trump by Judge Tanya Chutkan.

Garcia was also supported by the Alliance for Justice (AFJ), which has an anti-Trump agenda, according to InfluenceWatch, which wrote, "AFJ opposes President Donald Trump and blames his Supreme Court nominees for ruling against AFJ’s left-of-center policy initiatives. It has criticized President Trump for appointing conservative justices, and AFJ has campaigned for “packing” the Supreme Court by adding additional justices to “dilute” conservative influence over the Court."

Judge Florence Pan is no different. In her Senate Judiciary questionnaire, Pan noted she's taught law at Georgetown and American University, served as a senior advisor in the Clinton administration's Treasury Department, and in the Clinton administration Justice Department as an attorney in the Criminal Division Appellate Section.

She, too, is a registered Democrat in the District of Columbia and was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia by Biden in 2022, having previously served on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (the seat vacated by Ketanji Brown Jackson).

She's the first Chinese- American to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, and her appointment was hailed as "reflecting the full diversity of the American people" by the Biden White House.

She also has a troubling history of ruling against and attacking the Trump administration.

Last December, Pan issued a dissent against a D.C. Appeals Court panel blocking Judge James Boasberg from initiating contempt proceedings against the Trump administration. That same month, she complained that a D.C. Circuit Court panel ruled President Trump had the authority to fire the heads of the National Labor Relations Board and Merit Systems Protection Board, calling the move "autocracy." 

Pan called the Trump administration's efforts to ban illegal aliens from obtaining commercial driver's licenses "arbitrary and capricious," and said the administration's attempt to replace the head of the U.S. Copyright Office "blatant interference with the work of a legislative branch official." She also said that President Trump could not remove Biden appointee Hampton Dellinger from the Office of Special Counsel.

She upheld a lower court decision that barred the Trump administration from cutting $5 billion in foreign aid and said a freeze on billions in such aid "paves the way for future illegal conduct" by the executive branch.

In January 2024, Pan also got into a spat with a lawyer for President Trump during a hearing on whether or not President Trump had presidential immunity in relation to the Jack Smith investigation.

Temporary Protected Status was always meant to be that: temporary. President Trump and his administration have the authority to end TPS for Haitians and any other group of individuals in the United States, just as past Presidents — including Joe Biden — had the authority to extend TPS.

President Trump ran on and was elected to fulfill his campaign promises, of which ending TPS for Haitians and enforcing our immigration laws were two. But instead of respecting the will of the voters and the right of the Trump administration to govern, activists like Judge Garcia and Judge Pan use the courts to thwart President Trump's agenda and the will of the American people. And it's clear as day that the ruling isn't driven by law or facts, but by political ideology and an anti-Trump agenda.