BOSTON — Massachusetts Democratic leaders erupted Thursday after the United States Supreme Court cleared the Trump administration to end Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and Syrians, with Rep. Ayanna Pressley branding the conservative justices "Trump's co-conspirators in the Supreme Court" and Mayor Michelle Wu calling them "Donald Trump's enablers" and a "MAGA majority on the court."
The 6-3 ruling, written by Justice Samuel Alito along ideological lines, holds the president has unreviewable authority to terminate TPS designations and overturns a lower-court finding that the Haitian termination was likely driven in part by racial animus. It clears the path to revoke work authorization and removal protection for roughly 330,000 Haitians and 3,800 Syrians nationwide — a population concentrated in Boston, Brockton, Mattapan, and Hyde Park.
Pressley posted the "co-conspirators" line from the Supreme Court steps, where she protested live alongside Sen. Edward Markey. Sen. Elizabeth Warren called the decision "a disaster for the rule of law." Governor Maura Healey and Attorney General Andrea Campbell condemned the policy without going after the justices personally. In Washington, White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson called the ruling a "tremendous win," and senior policy adviser Stephen Miller called it "a monumental, colossal victory for the rule of law."
What the Supreme Court ruled
Alito, writing for the six-justice majority in Mullin v. Doe, found that the Immigration and Nationality Act gives the Department of Homeland Security secretary final, unreviewable authority over the designation and termination of TPS. Courts, the majority held, cannot second-guess that call. The three liberal justices dissented; Justice Sonia Sotomayor read her dissent from the bench.
The decision overturns a March 2025 preliminary injunction issued by Washington, D.C.-based U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, who had found the administration's move to end Haitian TPS was likely motivated in part by "racial animus." The Supreme Court rejected that framing and held the secretary's discretionary determination is not subject to judicial review on disparate-impact or animus grounds.
Pressley calls justices "Trump's co-conspirators"
Pressley posted from the Supreme Court steps Thursday afternoon as the ruling came down, with the sharpest single line from any Bay State elected official.
"BREAKING: Trump's co-conspirators in the Supreme Court just ended Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and Syrians. We're at the Supreme Court because we're not sitting idly by," Pressley wrote.
— Ayanna Pressley (@RepPressley) June 25, 2026BREAKING: Trump's co-conspirators in the Supreme Court just ended Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and Syrians. We're at the Supreme Court because we're not sitting idly by.
Pressley joined Markey and immigration advocates at the protest as the opinion was handed down. The "co-conspirators" framing — casting the six conservative justices as participants in a Trump political project rather than an independent branch — was the most aggressive characterization any Massachusetts Democrat put on the record Thursday.
Wu attacks "MAGA majority on the court"
Wu's Instagram statement — posted Thursday afternoon and signed "MAYOR MICHELLE WU" — aimed its sharpest language at the justices themselves, not the Trump administration.
"The City of Boston condemns this decision by Donald Trump's enablers on the U.S. Supreme Court," Wu wrote. "This ruling is as cruel as it is lawless. The justices have ignored the findings of our own government in a decision that will put lives in grave danger."
First page of Mayor Wu's Instagram statement on the Supreme Court's TPS ruling. Photo: @mayorwu/Instagram.
She went further in the second slide, accusing the majority of supplying political cover for the White House.
MASSDAILYNEWS
STAY UPDATED
Get Mass Daily News delivered to your inbox
ADVERTISEMENT · Interested in advertising?
ADVERTISEMENT · Interested in advertising?
"America has needed serious immigration reform for over a generation," Wu wrote. "Instead of doing the hard work to improve the asylum system and create pathways to citizenship, the Trump Administration is targeting people who came here seeking safety from violence. Today this politically-motivated attack was given legal blessing by the MAGA majority on the court."
Second page of Wu's statement, addressing the "MAGA majority on the court." Photo: @mayorwu/Instagram.
Wu also leaned into the Boston-specific stakes. "Here in Boston, thousands of Haitians live and work under Temporary Protected Status," she wrote. "They care for our loved ones, teach our little ones, staff our hospitals, drive our buses, and lead us in worship. Above all: they are our neighbors, and this is their home."
Warren splits the difference
Sen. Elizabeth Warren landed between the Pressley-Wu attack on the justices and the Healey-Campbell focus on the policy. Warren went after the Court as an institution but did not call the justices personally complicit.
"The Supreme Court is letting Trump ignore laws set by Congress and send hardworking, legal immigrants into imminent danger in Haiti, Syria, and other violent countries. It's horrific. This decision is a disaster for the rule of law and a disaster for thousands of families," Warren wrote.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) June 25, 2026The Supreme Court is letting Trump ignore laws set by Congress and send hardworking, legal immigrants into imminent danger in Haiti, Syria, and other violent countries. It's horrific. This decision is a disaster for the rule of law and a disaster for thousands of families.
"Disaster for the rule of law" is sharper than anything Healey or Campbell said, and Warren framed TPS holders as "legal immigrants" — pushing back on the administration's suggestion that protected-status holders are not lawfully here. But Warren stopped short of Pressley's "co-conspirators" or Wu's "enablers." She critiqued an outcome, not a cabal.
Healey and Campbell stay off the bench
Governor Healey's statement Thursday kept the verb on the policy and the president. "Today's decision upholding Donald Trump's cruel and harmful policy makes absolutely no sense and only serves to hurt our immigrant families, our communities, and our economy," Healey said in a statement issued by her office. "Massachusetts stands with our Haitian and Syrian communities today and every day."
Page one of Healey's official statement on the TPS ruling. Photo: Office of Governor Maura Healey.
Healey framed TPS holders as taxpayers, caregivers, and small-business owners — "part of the fabric of our communities" — and said her administration would "continue working closely with Attorney General Campbell, community organizations, employers and state agencies to support affected families." She did not call the majority MAGA, did not call the decision lawless, did not mention the justices at all.
Page two of Healey's statement, closing with the announcement her administration will work with AG Campbell, employers, and state agencies. Photo: Office of Governor Maura Healey.
ADVERTISEMENT · Interested in advertising?
ADVERTISEMENT · Interested in advertising?
Campbell took the same posture. "I am deeply disappointed by today's Supreme Court ruling allowing the termination of TPS for Haitians and Syrians," the attorney general wrote in her own statement Thursday. "This decision will have severe consequences in Massachusetts." Campbell named the case — Mullin v. Doe — and committed her office to working with Healey, community organizations, and employers to support TPS holders facing termination.
Campbell's official statement on the Mullin v. Doe ruling. Photo: Office of the Massachusetts Attorney General.
Campbell did not attack the justices. In April, ahead of oral arguments, she had publicly called on the Supreme Court to uphold TPS and vowed to "use every tool" her office has to protect Haitian and Syrian TPS holders. With Thursday's ruling, the legal route she was banking on is closed.
Meanwhile, conservatives celebrate
In Washington, the White House and Trump's immigration team treated the ruling as a clean victory.
"Today, the Supreme Court affirmed what President Trump has always maintained: temporary protected status is, by definition, temporary," White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement Thursday, calling the ruling a "tremendous win" for the administration. TPS, Jackson said, "was never intended to be a pathway to permanent status or legal residency, and it is committed to the discretion of the Secretary of Homeland Security. The Trump Administration continues to lawfully end the egregious abuses to our immigration system that have hurt Americans for years."
Stephen Miller, the senior policy adviser architecting the second-term immigration agenda, went further. He called the decision "a monumental, colossal victory for the rule of law" — the same "rule of law" framing Warren used to attack the outcome. The two sides spent Thursday fighting over the same phrase.
The break inside the Republican conference was narrow. Rep. Mike Lawler of New York, in a Democratic-leaning district, was the rare GOP member to publicly split with the White House. "While I have never disputed the ability of the president to end Temporary Protected Status, I strongly disagree with ending Haitian TPS at this time," Lawler wrote. Conservative outlets celebrated. Townhall called the ruling a "massive win for President Trump's immigration agenda."
What happens next
For the 330,000 Haitians and 3,800 Syrians on TPS, the immediate consequence is loss of legal authorization to work and exposure to removal proceedings. DHS sets the termination timeline; the lower-court challenges are now functionally foreclosed.
Wu's statement closed with a call on Congress to pass "permanent solutions and a pathway to citizenship for TPS holders," signing off in Haitian Creole: "Ansanm, nou pi fò." Together, we are stronger. That bill would need sixty votes in a Senate Republicans control, and a House majority that has shown no appetite for blanket TPS conversion.
The conservative legal movement spent two decades arguing the political branches — not federal judges — should decide who stays and who goes. Thursday, six justices wrote that argument into the United States Reports. Pressley and Wu called it a co-conspiracy. Miller called it the rule of law. The fight now moves to a Congress where neither side has the votes.
Loading Comments