Ukraine, Sudan immigrants to retain deportation protections for now

Immigrants from Ukraine and Sudan enrolled in the Temporary Protected Status policy will be able to live and work in the U.S. without fear of deportation for the time being, even though their protections were set to expire soon, the Department of Homeland Security told CBS News on Sunday.

The TPS protections of tens of thousands of Ukrainians and hundreds of Sudanese immigrants were officially slated to terminate on Monday.

But in statements on Sunday, DHS said final decisions on the fate of the humanitarian immigration programs will "be made at the appropriate time." 

Until such decisions are announced, DHS added, nationals of Ukraine and Sudan enrolled in the TPS program will "retain protection."

The decisions to keep the deportation protections in place, albeit not final, stand in sharp contrast to the Trump administration's broader posture toward TPS programs.

Trump administration officials have routinely denounced TPS as a de facto amnesty policy abused by the Biden administration that encourages illegal immigration and that has been extended too often, despite its temporary nature.

Over the past year and a half, the Trump administration, as part of its aggressive immigration crackdown, has revoked the TPS protections of more than 1 million immigrants from over a dozen countries, including Afghanistan, Haiti and Venezuela. 

The programs for Ukrainian and Sudanese nationals are among a handful of TPS policies that have remained in place nearly two years into President Trump's second term, alongside the protections for tens of thousands of immigrants from El Salvador. Their TPS program was also set to lapse last month, but DHS retained their protections, pending a final announcement.

Created in 1990 by Congress, TPS allows the U.S. government to offer a temporary deportation reprieve and work permits to immigrants, illegal and legal alike, who hail from countries facing armed conflict, an environmental disaster or another crisis that makes their return there unsafe.

The TPS policy for Ukrainians was first announced by the Biden administration in the spring of 2022, soon after Russia launched its full-blown invasion of Ukraine. As of March 2025, there were more than 100,000 Ukrainians enrolled in TPS, including those allowed into the U.S. under a Biden-era sponsorship policy.

The TPS program for Sudan has been around since the late 1990s, with different administrations extending the policy due to the armed conflict and political turmoil that has plagued the African nation. As of March 2025, roughly 1,800 Sudanese nationals had TPS.

This story published first on CBS News at 1:44 p.m. on Oct. 18, 2026.