Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/20-315_q713.pdf
Page Number: 7

Cite as:  593 U. S. ____ (2021) 

5 

Opinion of the Court 

§1255(a).  And  another  provision  says  that  a  person  who
has  worked  without  authorization  in  the  country—as 
Sanchez did for several years—may become an LPR only if 
his presence in the United States is “pursuant to a lawful 
admission.”  §1255(k).  Sanchez has never claimed that he 
can, without aid from the TPS provision, satisfy those de-
mands  for  admission.4   A  straightforward  application  of
§1255 thus supports the Government’s decision to deny him
LPR status. 

And nothing in the conferral of TPS changes that result.
As noted earlier, a TPS recipient is “considered as being in,
and maintaining, lawful status as a nonimmigrant” for the 
purpose of becoming an LPR.  §1254a(f )(4); see supra, at 2. 
That provision ensures that, in applying for permanent res-
idency, a TPS recipient will be treated as having nonimmi-
grant status—even if, like Sanchez, he really does not.  See 
§1101(a)(15) (not including TPS recipients among the des-
ignated  classes  of  “nonimmigrants”).    It  thus  guarantees
that  every  TPS  recipient  has  the  status  traditionally  and 
generally needed to invoke §1255’s adjustment process.  See 
§1255  (titled  “[a]djustment  of  status  of  nonimmigrant  to 
that of person admitted for permanent residence” (boldface 
deleted)).  But the provision does not aid the TPS recipient
in  meeting  §1255’s  independent  legal-entry  requirement.
Lawful  status  and  admission,  as  the  court  below  recog-
nized, are distinct concepts in immigration law: Establish-
ing one does not necessarily establish the other.  See supra, 
at 3–4.  On the one hand, a foreign national can be admitted 
—————— 

4 The Government notes that Sanchez was treated as “paroled” when 
he  returned  from  an  authorized  trip  abroad  after  obtaining  TPS.    See 
Brief for Respondents 15, n. 5.  But Sanchez has never claimed that this 
treatment  made  him  eligible  to  adjust  to  LPR  status  under  §1255(a). 
That  is  probably  because  the  argument  could  not  have  mattered: 
§1255(k) stands as an independent prohibition on his invoking the LPR 
process.  See supra, at 2, n. 1.  We express no view on whether a parole
of the kind Sanchez received enables a TPS recipient to become an LPR 
absent any other bar in §1255.