Week of January 28 – February 3, 2026

California senators voted 30 to 10, along party lines, to send the Assembly a bill making it easier for people to sue federal officers over civil rights violations. The measure, from Sens. Scott Wiener and Aisha Wahab and known as the No Kings Act, gained urgency after federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti, a U.S. citizen and intensive care nurse, in Minnesota.

It is one of several bills California Democrats are moving this year in response to federal enforcement. Others would tax for-profit detention companies, bar state and local law enforcement officers from taking second jobs as federal immigration agents, and restrict unannounced arrests in courthouses. A separate proposal would allow remote appearances for most state court hearings through January 2029.

The bills follow laws signed last year that barred agents from wearing masks and limited their access to schools and hospitals, several of which are being challenged in court.

Source: CalMatters

A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem exceeded her authority when she ended temporary protected status for Venezuelans, upholding a lower court. The panel reached the same conclusion about her early termination of TPS for Haitians.

Judge Kim Wardlaw wrote that the statute Congress passed contains procedural safeguards meant to give TPS holders predictability, and does not allow the secretary to vacate an existing designation. She said the terminations had already produced deportations and detentions of people with no criminal records.

The ruling has no immediate practical effect. The Supreme Court allowed Noem's decision to take effect in October while it considers the case. Haiti's TPS designation was scheduled to end on February 3.

Source: NBC News

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton announced an investigation into alleged abuse of the H-1B visa program by Texas businesses, opening with civil investigative demands to three North Texas companies.

His office said the companies are suspected of operating as sham employers, advertising products or services they do not provide in order to sponsor H-1B petitions. One business is alleged to have registered a single-family home as its office and listed an empty, unfinished building as its worksite. The demands seek employee lists, records of the services actually provided, financial statements and internal communications.

The investigation runs alongside Gov. Greg Abbott's order restricting H-1B filings by state agencies and public universities. Paxton said his office would continue reviewing the program.

Source: Texas Attorney General

Federal judges in several states issued unusually blunt rulings accusing Immigration and Customs Enforcement of ignoring their orders, particularly orders requiring the release of detained immigrants.

Judge Patrick Schiltz, chief judge of Minnesota's federal bench, estimated conservatively that the agency had violated orders from Minnesota judges 96 times in January alone. Judge Michael Davis, also in Minnesota, wrote of an undeniable move by the government to defy court orders or stretch the legal process to deny noncitizens due process.

Judges elsewhere echoed the complaint. A New Jersey judge found the administration knowingly disregarded a release order by imposing electronic monitoring. A Florida judge threatened sanctions against government attorneys. Judges in Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Los Angeles found detainees had been moved or held in violation of standing orders.

Source: Politico

Gov. Greg Abbott prohibited Texas public universities and state agencies from initiating new H-1B visa petitions without written permission from the Texas Workforce Commission, an order that runs through the end of the next legislative session on May 31, 2027. He also ordered institutions to report their new and existing H-1B filings.

More than 40,000 people work in Texas on H-1B visas, most of them at private companies. At public institutions the share is small: about 200 of Texas A&M University's 30,000 employees and 228 of UT Southwestern Medical Center's 25,000.

Congress caps the visa at 65,000 a year, with 20,000 more for holders of U.S. master's degrees; universities are exempt from that cap. Immigration attorneys said affected workers would have to leave the state or the country.

Source: The Texas Tribune

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson signed an executive order directing the Chicago Police Department to investigate and document alleged illegal activity by federal immigration agents, and to refer evidence of possible felonies to the Cook County State's Attorney's Office.

The order, branded ICE On Notice, sets out procedures for officers to capture, preserve and report evidence when federal agents appear to break state or local law. The mayor's office said it makes Chicago the first U.S. city to build that kind of process.

Tricia McLaughlin, an assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security, called the claims of criminal misconduct by ICE officers false. The order follows months of federal operations in the Chicago area under Operation Midway Blitz, which began in September 2025.

Source: Newsweek

U.S. District Judge Katherine Menendez rejected Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison's request to block Operation Metro Surge, the federal enforcement campaign in the Twin Cities. In a 30-page decision she found the state unlikely to succeed on its claim that the deployment violates the Tenth Amendment.

Minnesota, joined by Minneapolis and St. Paul, argued the surge forces it to divert police resources and pressures it to abandon sanctuary policies. Menendez wrote that no existing case comes close to the situation, though she noted the suit is not without merit and suggested agents have engaged in racial profiling and used excessive force.

The government has said roughly 3,000 ICE and Customs and Border Protection personnel are deployed under the operation, first announced in December. Ellison said the state would continue the case.

Source: The Hill

U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes stayed the termination of temporary protected status for Haitians, which had been due to lapse the following day. More than 500,000 Haitians in the United States keep their work authorization and protection from deportation under the order, which also preserves benefits for people with pending TPS applications.

Haitians have held TPS since the 2010 earthquake, and the designation has been renewed repeatedly. A lawsuit filed in July argued that conditions have not improved, citing gang control of roughly 90 percent of the capital and more than 5,600 killings in 2024. The State Department advises Americans not to travel to Haiti for any reason.

Tricia McLaughlin of the Department of Homeland Security said the government would seek Supreme Court review.

Source: Axios

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced that initial registration for the fiscal 2027 H-1B cap opens at noon Eastern time on March 4 and closes at noon Eastern time on March 19. Employers must register each prospective beneficiary through a USCIS online account and pay $215 per registration. Only registrations filed in that window are eligible for selection.

USCIS said it will notify employers of selected registrations by March 31 through their online accounts. Selected employers may file full cap-subject petitions on or after April 1, generally within a 90-day filing period.

This is the first cycle in which the agency will use a wage-based selection system if registrations exceed the cap, giving greater weight to higher-paid positions rather than relying solely on a random lottery.

Source: Newsweek

The Small Business Administration issued policy guidance blocking all non-U.S. citizens and nationals from its 7(a) loan program, the agency's primary lending channel for small businesses.

The guidance rescinds a narrow exception that had allowed foreign nationals and lawful permanent residents to hold up to 5 percent of a borrowing company. Green card holders are now ineligible to own any share of a business seeking a 7(a) loan. An SBA spokesperson said the agency will no longer guarantee loans for small businesses owned by foreign nationals.

Sen. Ed Markey and Rep. Nydia Velazquez, the ranking Democrats on the Senate and House small business committees, criticized the change, saying it bars lawful immigrants from a program they have long been eligible to use.

Source: Axios

Would-be immigrants, U.S. citizens petitioning for relatives and resettlement agencies sued the State Department over its January decision to pause immigrant visa processing for nationals of 75 countries on the grounds that they may come to rely on public benefits.

The 107-page complaint calls the policy a categorical nationality-based ban covering nearly half of all immigrant visa applicants, and argues it rests on an unsupported claim about welfare use. The plaintiffs say a change of that scale required notice-and-comment rulemaking rather than a cable that was never published.

State Department principal deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott said a visa is a privilege, not a right, and that Secretary of State Marco Rubio has made clear immigrants must be financially self-sufficient.

Source: The Hill

The Department of Homeland Security, in consultation with the Department of Labor, issued a final rule making up to 64,716 additional H-2B temporary nonagricultural worker visas available for fiscal 2026, on top of the statutory cap.

The supplemental visas go only to employers that attest they are suffering or will suffer irreparable harm, meaning permanent and severe financial loss, without the workers. DHS will distribute them in three allocations keyed to the employer's start date of need through the end of the fiscal year.

The rule took effect January 30 and runs through September 30, 2026. DHS will not accept petitions under the supplemental allocations after September 15, 2026, and will not approve any after September 30, 2026.

Source: Federal Register