SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A federal appeals court on Friday blocked the Trump administration’s plans to end protections for 600,000 people from Venezuela who have had permission to live and work in the United States.

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court ruling that maintained temporary protected status for Venezuelans while the case proceeded through court.

An email to the Department of Homeland Security for comment was not immediately returned.

The 9th Circuit panel found that plaintiffs were likely to succeed on their claim that the department had no authority to vacate or set aside a prior TPS extension because the governing statute written by Congress does not permit for it.

“In enacting the TPS statute, Congress designed a system of temporar

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