A sweeping court order that halted the deportation of hundreds of thousands of Haitian migrants has ignited a political firestorm, putting the spotlight squarely on the judge who issued it and her history of political giving.
According to the New York Post, U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes, who blocked the Trump administration from revoking Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for roughly 350,000 Haitians, is now facing criticism from Republicans after records showed she has donated more than $38,000 to Democratic candidates and causes over the years.
The ruling immediately drew outrage from administration officials and GOP lawmakers, who accused the court of overstepping its authority.
Among the most vocal critics was Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), who argued that the decision effectively locked in immigration protections that were meant to be temporary.
“When a Democrat president can create a TEMPORARY program and an unelected Democrat judge can unilaterally block a duly-elected Republican president from ever undoing it, we do not live in a democracy,” Moreno said. “This outrageous decision cannot stand.”
Reyes was appointed to the federal bench by then-President Joe Biden in February 2023. That appointment came just one month after the Biden administration began allowing up to 30,000 Haitians per month into the United States under a humanitarian parole program.
Before becoming a judge, Reyes worked as a litigation attorney at Williams & Connolly LLP, focusing on international disputes, while also providing pro bono legal work for refugee organizations.
Born in Uruguay, she immigrated to the United States as a child and grew up in Kentucky.
Campaign finance records show Reyes has donated exclusively to Democratic candidates since at least 2008.
During the 2020 election cycle, she made two maximum $2,800 contributions to Biden for President. She also gave $2,700 to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Reyes donated $4,500 to then-Sen. Kamala Harris’ 2019 Democratic primary bid and contributed $200 to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s congressional campaign in 2019.
Moreno and other Republicans seized on those donations following Reyes’ ruling, which found that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem lacked the authority to terminate TPS for Haitian migrants.
“Supreme Court, here we come,” DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin responded on X. “Haiti’s TPS was granted following an earthquake that took place over 15 years ago, it was never intended to be a de facto amnesty program, yet that’s how previous administrations have used it for decades.”
In her decision, Reyes wrote that it was “substantially likely” Noem moved to end the program “because of hostility to nonwhite immigrants.”
“Secretary Noem has terminated every TPS country designation to have reached her desk — twelve countries up, twelve countries down,” the judge wrote.
“Her conclusion that Haiti (a majority nonwhite country) faces merely ‘concerning’ conditions cannot be squared with the ‘perfect storm of suffering’ and ‘staggering’ ‘humanitarian toll’ described in page-after-page of the Certified Administrative Record (CAR).”
The TPS program, created in the 1990s, provides temporary legal status and work authorization to migrants from countries struck by natural disasters or armed conflict. Haiti was added after the devastating 2010 earthquake.
With similar rulings involving migrants from Venezuela and Nicaragua previously overturned on appeal, the administration has signaled it plans to challenge Reyes’ order next.
