Somalia's US Temporary Protected Status Ended on 14 August

Temporary Protected Status for Somalia ended on 14 August 2026. US Citizenship and Immigration Services states plainly on its Somalia TPS page that "the Somalia TPS designation is terminated, effective August 14, 2026", and its verification guidance issued the same day adds that Forms I-766 employment authorisation documents in categories A12 and C19 issued to Somalia TPS beneficiaries "are no longer valid". The date matters because it is exactly where a federal court order ran out. Since March, a stay from the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts had kept Somali beneficiaries in status and kept their work permits alive; that relief was pegged to 14 August, and the termination took effect the moment it lapsed. Anyone working on a Somalia TPS work permit lost the right to do so on that day, and their employer acquired an immediate duty to reverify.

Background

Somalia has been designated for TPS since 16 September 1991, one of the oldest designations in the programme, most recently with current designation dates from 18 September 2024 and designated through 17 March 2026. In January the Department of Homeland Security decided the country no longer met the statutory conditions and published a termination notice (91 Fed. Reg. 1547, 14 January 2026), setting the end at 17 March 2026. On 13 March, four days before that, the District of Massachusetts stayed the termination in African Communities Together et al. v. Noem et al., No. 26-cv-11201, and beneficiaries kept their status and documents under the court order. The picture changed on 25 June, when the US Supreme Court decided Mullin v. Doe, 609 U.S. ____ (2026), allowing TPS terminations to proceed in a parallel case. USCIS cites that decision on the Somalia page, and the agency's own guidance from 12 August had already described the extension as "limited relief until the lower courts align with" it.

What exactly changed

Up to 13 August, USCIS guidance told employers and benefit agencies that Somalia TPS beneficiaries kept their status, that Form I-766 employment authorisation documents in categories A12 and C19 remained valid per court order, and that the SAVE verification system would return an employment-authorised-through date of 14 August 2026. From 14 August, none of that holds. The designation is terminated, the EADs issued under it are no longer valid, and USCIS has archived the country page that carried the court-order guidance. There is no grace period built into the termination. Employers who have Somalia TPS beneficiaries on their books must reverify them and may not continue employing someone who cannot show valid employment authorisation.

Who it affects

The people directly affected are Somali nationals in the United States who held TPS, some of them for many years, along with employers who accepted a TPS work permit as the basis for employment. In practical terms this reaches households rather than individuals. A parent working on an A12 card who is the sole earner loses income on the day the card stops being valid. Someone mid-way through an adjustment of status application based on a family petition still has that application, but no longer has the TPS status or work permit that made staying and working lawful in the meantime. Anyone who travelled on TPS-based advance parole faces a separate and now sharper set of questions, given the Board of Immigration Appeals decision on advance parole and unlawful presence earlier this month.

What this means in practice

The step that matters most is finding out whether another basis to stay and work exists, and doing that with a qualified adviser rather than from a summary like this one. USCIS points people to its Explore My Options page and to accredited legal service providers, and it notes that time held in TPS counts as an extraordinary circumstance for the one-year asylum filing deadline, which "stops the clock" if that clock has not already expired. Employers should treat this as a reverification exercise with a firm date attached, not a wait-and-see. Because the underlying litigation has not visibly closed, check the USCIS TPS Somalia page directly rather than relying on any secondary account, including this one. Our United States country guide (/country-guides/united-states) covers the wider landscape of status, work and residence there.