Trump to deport Ukrainian refugees

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump’s administration is planning to revoke temporary legal status for some 240,000 Ukrainians who fled the conflict with Russia, a senior Trump official and three sources familiar with the matter said, potentially putting them on a fast-track to deportation.

The move, expected as soon as April, would be a stunning reversal of the welcome Ukrainians received under President Joe Biden’s administration. The planned rollback of protections for Ukrainians was underway before Trump publicly feuded with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky last week. It is part of a broader Trump administration effort to strip legal status from more than 1.8 million migrants allowed to enter the US under temporary humanitarian parole programs launched under the Biden administration, the sources said.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt pushed back on the Reuters report in a post on X, saying “no decision has been made at this time.” US Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said on Wednesday that the department had no new announcements. Ukrainian government agencies did not respond to requests for comment.

A Trump executive order issued on January 20 called for DHS to “terminate all categorical parole programmes.” The administration plans to revoke parole for about 530,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans as soon as this month, the Trump official and one of the sources familiar with the matter said, requesting anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. The plan to revoke parole for those nationalities was first reported by CBS News.

Migrants stripped of their parole status could face fast-track deportation proceedings, according to an internal ICE email seen by Reuters. Immigrants who cross the border illegally can be put into the fast-track deportation process known as expedited removal, for two years after they enter. But for those who entered through legal ports of entry without being officially “admitted” to the US - as with those on parole - there is no time limit on their rapid removal, the email said.

The Biden programmes were part of a broader effort to create temporary legal pathways to deter illegal immigration and provide humanitarian relief. In addition to the 240,000 Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion, and the 530,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans, these programmes covered more than 70,000 Afghans escaping the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan. An additional 1 million migrants scheduled a time to cross at a legal border crossing via an app known as CBP One.