WASHINGTON — Homeland Security officials have formally extended protections that allowed immigrants from four countries to live and work legally in the United States.

The move Thursday complies with a federal judge’s ruling that halted the decision to discontinue temporary protected status for people from Sudan, Nicaragua, Haiti and El Salvador.

The California judge ruled in October. The protections were set to expire in May, but will be extended until the preliminary injunction remains in effect.

“TPS for those countries will not be terminated unless and until any superseding, final, non-appealable judicial order permits the implementation of such termination,” the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services order says.

Temporary protected status is granted to countries ravaged by natural disasters or war and lets citizens of those countries remain in the U.S. until the situation improves back home. About 300,000 people have received those protections.

“For federal D.C. policy advocates like myself, the extension is good because it gives us more time to recalibrate our legislative, regulatory and political strategy,” said Maritza T. Adonis, federal temporary protected status campaign consultant for the Florida Immigrant Coalition.