ICE has detained several Nevada immigrants with temporary protected status, and lawyers say the law is being misread

What happened

The Nevada Independent reported that federal immigration agents have quietly detained, and in some cases tried to deport, several Nevada residents who hold temporary protected status, known as TPS. The program offers special protection from deportation to immigrants from designated countries considered highly dangerous.

Advocates and legal experts told the outlet that the Trump administration is misreading the grounds on which TPS holders can be deported. They said people are being taken into custody while they wait for renewals or work through administrative problems.

Cases in Nevada

A longtime Las Vegas resident

One case involves Lucio Alexander Bernal Munoz, who came to the U.S. from El Salvador in the 1990s and had lived in Las Vegas for decades, according to court records cited by the outlet. After he was charged with drug possession in April, ICE took him into custody, alleging he lacked a valid visa and had not been properly admitted to the country.

When he was arrested, Bernal Munoz was waiting for his status to be renewed. His attorney, Melissa Corral, disputed ICE's reasoning, telling The Nevada Independent, "That was the basis for his removal proceedings, and that's not true."

Reno and the Nevada Southern Detention Center

In June, ICE officials in Reno detained a TPS holder from Haiti, the outlet reported. That came a month before DHS ended the program for nearly 350,000 Haitians nationwide. A couple of months earlier, a TPS recipient from Utah was held at the Nevada Southern Detention Center after he was mistaken for his brother.

Union members affected

Ted Pappageorge, secretary-treasurer of Culinary Workers Union Local 226, said several union members with TPS have been detained or "harassed" by ICE over the past year. The union counts thousands of Salvadoran TPS holders among its members and has publicly pushed to extend their protections. "TPS are workers that have suffered incredible trauma," he said.

How TPS works and what has changed

TPS has been in place since 1990. It gives immigrants from designated countries lawful immigration status and work permits for renewable periods of up to 18 months. It has been widely seen as a lifeline for people facing political persecution, natural disasters or other dangers at home.

According to The Nevada Independent, President Donald Trump has ended the program for 13 of the 17 designated countries, eliminating TPS for more than a million people. Nevada is home to approximately 5,000 TPS recipients from El Salvador, and the administration has not publicly announced whether that program will be extended.

The ability of courts to review these matters has also narrowed. In June, the Supreme Court ruled that courts had no jurisdiction over challenges claiming DHS broke the law in granting, renewing or ending TPS, with an exception for lawsuits brought on constitutional grounds.

What lawyers and advocates say

Michael Kagan, director of the UNLV Immigration Clinic, said ICE agents typically follow a policy of "arrest first, ask questions later" with people who hold provisional statuses. He said he has heard of a handful of Nevada cases and that past administrations did not go after people renewing their status or penalize them for slow processing.

Kagan described people who have done everything correctly but are still waiting on the government to act on their application. In that gap, he said, ICE treats them "like they can be deported." Francis Garcia of the National TPS Alliance put it more bluntly: "They're misinterpreting the law."

Advice for people with lawful status

Corral urged immigrants with lawful status to resolve any pending legal issues, even something as minor as a traffic violation. "If you end up putting a foot in that jail, ICE will be alerted," she told the outlet. More coverage of issues affecting local families is available in our community section.

What to watch next

• Whether the Trump administration extends TPS for El Salvador, which covers approximately 5,000 Nevada recipients; no decision has been publicly announced.
• How ICE treats TPS holders whose renewal applications are still pending, which lawyers say has led to detentions in Nevada.
• Whether the Culinary Union's push to extend protections for its Salvadoran TPS members gains a response while the program remains in limbo.