Kristi Noem’s plan to strip legal protections from hundreds of thousands of immigrants has been frozen in an embarrassing court judgment that used her own unpleasant description of them against her.
In a December 2025 post on X, the homeland security secretary said that she had “just met with the President” and was “recommending a full travel ban on every damn country that’s been flooding our nation with killers, leeches, and entitlement junkies.”
One of those “damn” countries was Haiti. Three days before the post, Noem moved to terminate the country’s temporary protected status designation, which allowed Haitians to live and work legally in the U.S. temporarily following a devastating 2010 earthquake, beginning Feb. 3.
Playing to her MAGA base, Noem, 54, added in her post that America was not built “for foreign invaders to slaughter our heroes, suck dry our hard-earned tax dollars, or snatch the benefits owed to AMERICANS,” before finishing: “WE DON’T WANT THEM. NOT ONE.”
Noem’s over-the-top social media rhetoric has now come back to haunt her.
In a case brought by five Haitians, Judge Ana C. Reyes of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia halted the administration’s attempt to revoke temporary protected status for the 350,000 Haitians living in the U.S.
In a blistering 83-page opinion released Monday, Reyes, who was appointed by President Joe Biden, said Noem “does not have the facts on her side” and “does not have the law on her side,” so, instead, “she pounds X.”
She added that, while Noem is free, as a private citizen, to call immigrants “killers, leeches [and] entitlement junkies,” as homeland secretary, she is bound by the Constitution and the TPS statute.
The judge then granted a stay under the Administrative Procedure Act, blocking Noem and President Donald Trump, 79, from ending temporary protected status (TPS) for Haiti while the lawsuit proceeds.
Reyes opened her judgment by contrasting President George Washington’s 1783 assurance that America would welcome the “oppressed & persecuted of all Nations & Religions” with Congress’ modern TPS program.
The legal program allows people from disaster-stricken countries like Haiti to live and work in the U.S., which, the judge noted, generates about $5.2 billion in annual tax revenue.
Reyes then turned to Noem, the official in charge of that program, who has been nicknamed “ICE Barbie” for her love of dressing up like her frontline agents for photoshoots.
The judge dryly wrote that Haitians are “not, it emerges, ‘killers, leeches, or entitlement junkies,’” but professionals and students whose lives are rooted in the U.S. TPS community.
The plaintiffs are a cross-section of Haitian TPS holders. They include a neuroscientist, Fritz Emmanuel Lesly Miot; a software engineer, Rudolph Civil; a lab assistant, Marlene Gail Noble; an economics student, Marica Merline Laguerre; and a registered nurse, Vilbrun Dorsainvil.
They argue that Noem’s termination order flouts both the APA and the Fifth Amendment by ignoring the statutory requirement to consult other agencies. The point to what the U.N. secretary-general has called a “perfect storm of suffering” in Haiti, and they say, is aimed at a majority-nonwhite population out of hostility to nonwhite immigrants.
Reyes agrees the plaintiffs are likely to succeed.
The judge also pointed out that the State Department currently warns Americans: “Do not travel to Haiti for any reason,” which she said undermines Noem’s claim that the country is now safe.
On the issue of irreparable harm, the government argued that TPS holders might not be deported even if their status expired.
Reyes again threw Noem’s own rhetoric back at her, citing the “WE DON’T WANT THEM. NOT ONE” line to show that Haitians have every reason to fear the administration will rush to kick them out.
Finding that the law, the evidence, the public interest, and the balance of harms all favor the migrants, Reyes formally granted their motion and paused the termination order nationwide.
It means TPS for Haitians remains in force while the case continues.
The Department of Homeland Security has said it plans to appeal. Assistant Homeland Security Secretary Tricia McLaughlin told the Daily Beast: “Supreme Court, here we come—this is lawless activism that we will be vindicated on."
She added: “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. Temporary means temporary and the final word will not be from an activist judge legislating from the bench.”
Monday’s ruling follows earlier courtroom setbacks for Noem’s deportation crusade, including cases over TPS for Venezuelans and for migrants from Nepal, Honduras, and Nicaragua.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
