Advocacy and resettlement groups, including several in Massachusetts, are suing the Trump administration over three policies that block refugees from obtaining green cards, subject them to re-vetting, and speed up the process of ending their legal immigration status.
“The Administration’s coordinated attacks on lawfully admitted refugees hurt those refugees, their families, and the American businesses and communities where they work and live,” reads the lawsuit. “These attacks are also illegal and unconstitutional.”
The suit, filed on Monday in the District of Massachusetts in Boston, targets U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. GBH News has reached out to both agencies for comment.
The class action lawsuit lists four individual refugee plaintiffs, including one from Massachusetts. Lida A., the pseudonym for the woman listed in the complaint, is a 27-year-old refugee from Afghanistan. She worked for a U.S.-funded organization in Afghanistan and fled after the Taliban takeover. She was evacuated by the U.S. government and completed refugee processing overseas in Qatar, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit says she was admitted to the United States as a refugee in January 2024, and applied to adjust status in March 2025. Her application has not been adjudicated.
Plaintiffs are seeking immediate action to stop the policies, some of which started last year while others are more recent.
For example, an Oct. 14, 2026 rule cut the amount of time refugees have to respond to a notice to revoke their status from 30 days to 10. For over four decades, 30 days has been the norm.
The freeze on green card applications took effect in November 2025 and specifically applies to refugees admitted under the Biden administration. The same November 2025 policy directs USCIS to review and re-interview refugees who already completed extensive screening before being admitted to the United States, exposing them to possible termination of their refugee status. In the suit, plaintiffs call the change a “baseless fishing expedition.”
“We want the government to be ordered to begin processing green cards. We want the government to be ordered to stop revetting refugees simply because they were admitted during the presidency of Joe Biden,” said Jeff Thielman, CEO of International Institute of New England, one of the organizational plaintiffs. “And we want the government to not move forward with its policy of reducing the time for refugees to get lawyers should they have a notice of intent to terminate their refugee status from 30 days to 10 days.”
The impact of these policies has resulted in people being blocked on their path to citizenship after years in the U.S. despite extensive, yearslong vetting. It hascaused termination of work authorization. People put in removal proceedings face indefinite detention and deportation.
‘“This is a promise that our own country has made to these individuals and families. And so even after all of this, the current administration is now saying that for folks who have been here for years with this durable non-expiring status, ‘We actually want you to appear in court and we are notifying you that that status that we have granted you is being terminated if you do not defend yourself and essentially relitigate your case,’” said Camille Wathne, director of special projects at Jewish Family Service of Western Massachusetts, an organizational plaintiff.
They have about 1,000 clients impacted, waiting for their green card applications to be processed.
“These are people who have waited for years and undergone vetting, interviews, security clearances, medical exams, and extensive applications to the United States government to arrive here,” she said.
Other group plaintiffs include Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans, African Communities Together, HIAS, Refugee Council USA.
The other three individual plaintiffs are from Ethiopia, Colombia, and Iraq, and all fled persecution or were unlawfully detained while waiting for a decision on their green card applications.
According to the federal government’s own figures, about 113,000 refugees have pending applications for permanent residency, and the new termination rule could affect as many as 186,000 refugee cases.
