Washington DC - President Donald Trump's administration said Friday it was terminating the legal status of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, giving them weeks to leave the country.

The order affects around 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans who came to the United States under a scheme launched in October 2022 by Trump's predecessor Joe Biden and expanded in January the following year.

They will lose their Temporary Protected Status 30 days after the Department of Homeland Security's order is published in the Federal Register, which is scheduled Tuesday.

That means immigrants sponsored by the program "must depart the United States" by April 24 unless they have secured another immigration status allowing them to remain in the country, the order says.

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Welcome.US, which supports people seeking refuge in the United States, urged those affected by the move to "immediately" seek advice from an immigration lawyer.

The Processes for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans (CHNV) program, announced in January 2023, allowed entry to the US for two years for up to 30,000 migrants per month from the four countries.

But the Department of Homeland Security stressed Friday that the scheme was "temporary" and not an "underlying basis for obtaining any immigration status, nor does it constitute an admission to the United States."

Nicolette Glazer, an immigration lawyer in California, said the order would affect the "vast majority" of the half a million immigrants who entered the US under the CHNV scheme.

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"Only 75,000 affirmative asylum applications were filed, so the vast majority of the CHNV parolees will find themselves without status, work permits, and subject to removal," she posted on X.

Trump last weekend invoked rare wartime legislation to fly more than 200 Venezuelans it accused without proof of being part of a gang to El Salvador, which has offered to imprison migrants and even US citizens at a discount in a nightmarish facility.

It did so despite being ordered to immediately halt the deportation flights by a judge, whom Trump and his allies have since attacked publicly.