A briefing memo uncovered by a Republican lawmaker reportedly pressed former President Joe Biden, in the waning days of his presidency, to extend or re-designate migrants who were receiving so-called Temporary Protected Status in the United States, potentially sticking incoming President Donald Trump with an even bigger immigration crisis to sweep up.
According to Republican Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri, the move would have given over 3 million individuals legal protection under TPS, arguing that Trump had difficulty during his first term challenging such designations.
“My investigation uncovered that the Lame Duck Biden White House tried to keep millions of illegal aliens in our country by abusing the ‘Temporary’ Protected Status program,” Schmitt told Fox News Friday.
“After the American people voted for President Trump’s promise to end the TPS scam, the Biden administration tried to subvert the will of the American people. This was mass amnesty-by-decree.”
“America is for Americans, and it is our home — it is not a permanent refugee camp,” he added.
Schmitt said in a post that he “obtained this memo from the Archivist of the United States as part of a special access request I made as Chairman of the Subcommittee on the Constitution.”
TPS is supposed to be a program whereby people from a designated country who are in the United States get temporary protection to live and to work here due to some form of disaster or instability in their home country. However, the “temporary” part of Temporary Protected Status is a bit of a mockery.
For instance, El Salvador initially received TPS because it “suffered a devastating earthquake on January 13, 2001, and experienced two more earthquakes on February 13 and 17, 2001,” according to the Federal Register. It is still thusly designated, despite the efforts of the Trump administration, with the last extension coming just days before Biden left office. A judge temporarily blocked an attempt to strip Salvadorian TPS asylum-seekers of their status earlier this week.
And, according to a memo dated Jan. 2, 2025, sent to the president by his senior advisers, the legal limbo is all by design.
The memo, as published by Schmitt, details how “to expand TPS before YOU leave office,” including through an extension, which “enables those already covered by an existing grant of TPS to retain their protection and remain in the country,” and redesignation, which “extends coverage to those who entered the United States in the intervening months since the prior designation.”
Schmitt said that it “appears to be misdated,” but added the intent was clear: “His team was searching for ways to lock in his mass-migration regime before Trump took power.”
The memo, which appears to be misdated, is from Biden’s “Senior Advisors” in the waning days of his lame duck presidency.
It was the pitch to expand TPS “before YOU leave office.” His team was searching for ways to lock in his mass-migration regime before Trump took power.
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) July 23, 2026
This included extension and redesignation for Venezuelans, which would have protected Tren de Aragua gang members. Schmitt posted a clip of himself calling TPS under Democrats “a one-way racket toward permanent mass migration.”
The memo openly discusses rushing TPS extensions/redesignations and new designations before January 20 specifically to shield people from “President-elect Trump’s planned mass deportations.”
It frames the lame duck’s team’s actions as a deliberate barrier. pic.twitter.com/M6um8kVE13
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) July 23, 2026
And he wasn’t necessarily wrong. From the memo:
Stakeholders argue that granting TPS will potentially protect many vulnerable people from President-elect Trump’s planned mass deportations, including some who live in “mixed status” families with U.S. citizens. They argue that these protections are likely to hold in court, and they are prepared to litigate efforts to terminate or slow down the implementation of TPS for specified nations by the Trump Administration. While it is impossible to predict with certainty the likelihood of success of any future litigation, prior Federal litigation brought by advocates during the first Trump Administration was successful in halting the Trump Administration’s efforts to terminate TPS, though that was due in large part to the prior Administration’s failure to produce a factual record in support of termination, which is something that could be rectified. The litigation also became moot before the appellate process concluded, and so it is uncertain how it would have ultimately been resolved.
While TPS historically had bipartisan support, Republicans have recently criticized YOUR Administration’s grants of TPS as a form of amnesty. They also allege that TPS encourages illegal immigration from countries that receive TPS and that it is no longer “temporary” given that once granted it has not generally been rescinded. Should the Secretary of Homeland Security redesignate Venezuelan nationals for TPS, Republicans are likely to argue that YOU provided amnesty to Tren de Aragua gang members. Lastly, as noted above, President-elect Trump, has threatened to “revoke” TPS for Haitians when he takes office.
Gotta love the quotation marks around “revoke,” as if it’s somehow illegitimate. (Haiti has “only” been on the “temporary” list since 2010.) Meanwhile, Schmitt points out the obvious: “The memo states the motive openly, appease Leftist stakeholders.”
The memo states the motive openly, appease Leftist stakeholders.
Supporters wanted Biden to “protect” migrants from President-elect Trump’s “planned mass deportations.”
They were asking a defeated President to obstruct the immigration mandate Americans had just delivered. pic.twitter.com/YjM9dzUZyR
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) July 23, 2026
And the stakeholders would be mighty happy at the numbers this would deliver: 3.1 million shielded.
The most disturbing part, Biden’s “Senior Advisors” recommended he create 2.1 million NEW TPS designees in the last few weeks of his Presidency, despite admitting TPS applications take 6 months.
Luckily, that never happened and we have been deporting Ecuadorians and Guatemalans. pic.twitter.com/AuUvRkwkz7
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) July 23, 2026
And unbelievably, the memo recommended circumventing the six-month period for implementing TPS designations, creating 2.1 million new people protected under it. Luckily, this didn’t happen — although, as Schmitt noted, this did end in some kind of concrete action:
A week after receiving this memo, President Biden extended TPS for nearly 1,000,000 noncitizens, protecting them from deportation.
This shows this memo probably led to a concrete mass migration action. pic.twitter.com/e2Ai9jSfA1
— Senator Eric Schmitt (@SenEricSchmitt) July 23, 2026
Again, this is why TPS is a program that needs to be dramatically curtailed, if not ended. Because, quite simply, it has nothing to do with being temporary.
Until the border crisis became wholly toxic for Joe Biden, he didn’t even plan to do anything about it. Then, in the last few weeks of his term, he tried to make it impossible for Trump to undo the damage his deliberate inattention to immigration law had wrought.
Malfeasance has consequences. Let’s hope the consequence of this is that TPS is permanently altered so that no liberals can do what Joe Biden and some judges have done already.
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