Temporary Protected Status for El Salvador was scheduled to terminate on September 9, 2026, ending a designation first granted in 2001. The deadline arrived without a decision from the Department of Homeland Security, leaving roughly 200,000 Salvadorans — many of whom have lived in the United States for more than 25 years — in a day of acute uncertainty before USCIS clarified their position that evening.
Asked about the deadline, DHS told ABC News: “An announcement on El Salvador’s TPS will be made at the appropriate time. Until such announcement is made, Salvadoran individuals present in the U.S. under TPS retain protection.” USCIS’s El Salvador TPS page carries the same language and adds that the retained protection includes work authorization. Later on September 9, USCIS issued a notice confirming that both TPS protections and the work permits of El Salvador TPS holders remain valid for now.
That clarification mattered because the two halves of TPS do not expire the same way. Immigration attorneys warned during the day that employment authorization documents had lapsed on September 9 with no extension in place. “Their work permits expired today, which puts them in a very difficult situation. It puts their employment at risk without any sort of extension of their work authorization,” said Julie Mitchell, an immigration attorney with the Central American Resource Center. Mitchell noted that Salvadorans were not immediately exposed to deportation, because the statute requires 60 days’ notice before a termination takes effect — but an EAD can expire with no advance notice at all, and without a valid document an employer cannot complete Form I-9 verification.
There is also a statutory default that works in beneficiaries’ favor. If the Homeland Security Secretary takes no action before a designation’s expiration date, TPS is automatically extended for six months. That provision was triggered in May 2026 for roughly 11,000 Lebanese TPS holders, who received another 180 days of status and work authorization by operation of law rather than by announcement.
The stakes are concrete. Salvadoran TPS holders have a labor force participation rate of about 90%, contribute an estimated $5.4 billion annually to U.S. GDP, and pay roughly $1.5 billion a year in federal, state and local taxes, with heavy representation in construction, hospitality, manufacturing, transportation and food service. They are also parents to more than 150,000 U.S. citizen children.
What remains unresolved is duration. USCIS has confirmed the status quo holds but has not said for how long, and no Federal Register notice has yet set out either an extension or a termination with its 60-day clock. Salvadoran TPS holders and their employers should watch for that notice, keep evidence of continued status, and avoid assuming that the current reprieve is permanent.
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Source: LinkedIn - Dawn Lurie (Seyfarth Shaw, Immigration Compliance Counsel)