TPS for Haiti, Venezuela, and Ukraine: Current Status and Work Authorization in 2025
Temporary Protected Status, authorized under 8 U.S.C. section 1254a, allows nationals of designated countries experiencing armed conflict, environmental disasters, or other extraordinary conditions to remain and work in the United States for the duration of the designation. TPS designations for Haiti, Venezuela, and Ukraine collectively cover well over 500,000 individuals — and each designation has followed a distinct and complicated legal path that practitioners must track independently.
Haiti's TPS designation has been in continuous litigation since the first Trump administration attempted to terminate it in 2018. A series of preliminary injunctions and subsequent Biden administration re-designations have kept Haitian TPS alive, but the status of Haiti TPS holders remains dependent on the most recent designation rather than on any continuous protection that can be assumed. As of the 2026 filing date, Haiti's TPS designation is effective through February 3, 2026, with a pending extension determination. Employment Authorization Documents based on Haiti TPS have been automatically extended multiple times through Federal Register notices — practitioners must verify that their clients' EADs bear the correct automatically-extended validity date, which is found in the Federal Register notice applicable to the period in question, not on the face of the EAD card.
Venezuela's TPS situation is especially complex because there are two separate Venezuela TPS designations: an initial designation from March 2021 (covering those continuously resident since March 8, 2021) and a second re-designation from October 2023 (covering those continuously resident since July 31, 2023). The two groups have different registration periods, different evidence requirements, and potentially different end-dates. Attorneys must determine which designation their client is registered under to advise accurately on status and work authorization periods.
A federal court injunction issued in July 2024 temporarily blocked the termination of Venezuela TPS that had been announced by DHS, and the case was pending on appeal as of mid-2026. The outcome of that litigation could affect hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans in the United States. Practitioners advising Venezuelan TPS holders should follow the docket in National TPS Alliance v. DHS (N.D. Cal.) and be prepared to advise clients on contingency planning if the injunction is ultimately dissolved.
Ukraine's TPS designation is the most recently issued and carries a cleaner administrative history, having been designated in April 2022 following Russia's full-scale invasion. The current designation extends through October 19, 2026, and renewal applications for Ukrainian TPS holders have been processed with relatively short timelines. However, individuals who arrived after the initial designation cutoff date and who entered on other visas or through humanitarian parole programs — particularly those admitted under Uniting for Ukraine (U4U) — have a different legal status that does not automatically convert to TPS, and many are approaching the end of their parole periods without alternative status.
For all three country designations, the critical documentation issue is EAD validity in the context of I-9 employer compliance. Employers conducting I-9 audits must understand that automatically-extended TPS EADs remain valid for I-9 purposes even where the date on the card face has passed, provided the extension is documented through Federal Register notices. USCIS has published employer guidance on this point, and attorneys should ensure their employer clients are using the current I-9 Supplement B process for re-verification of auto-extended TPS EADs.