After a brief search for new talent, the Executive branch hired Justices John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito and Neil Gorsuch (the Majority) away from the Supreme Court. They’ll report directly to the President.
To please their new boss, the Majority held that federal court injunctions apply only to those with standing to sue and not to the rest of the country, which frees Trump to ignore the 40 nationwide injunctions against him that don’t apply to anyone without standing to sue.
For example, assume several journalists challenge the constitutionality of an Executive Order allowing Trump to jail journalists who criticize him, that a federal court enjoins the jailing of those journalists, but that the Majority blocks the injunction until it decides whether the Order isunconstitutional, as it just did in the in the birthright citizen case, which can take years. So, Trump would be free to jail journalists who didn’t have standing to sue until then.
Before the Majority got the opportunity to address the scope of federal court injunctions, the injunction against jailing those journalists would have applied nationwide and protected all jailed journalists critical of Trump. But now it won’t. Instead, Trump will be free to ignore all similar injunctions intended to apply to journalists nationwide until the Constitutional issue is decided by the Supreme Court.
In the birthright citizenship case, Trump issued an Executive Order to undo birthright citizenship for all children born on or after February 19, 2025, who do not have a parent with permanent resident or U.S. citizenship status at the time of birth. Parents, many of whom were pregnant, sued to protect their children born on or after February 19. A District Court held the order to be unconstitutional and enjoined deporting the children.
Not surprisingly, the Supreme Court blocked the injunction until it can hold hearings and decide the constitutionality of Trump’s attempt to undo birthright citizenship because Trump didn’t ask it to – a cunning strategy. Although the Court could have decided the issue anyway, the Majority chose not to — probably because the 14th Amendment clearly mandates that “All persons born … in the United States … are citizens of the United States ….” Trump is now free to deport thousands of children that fit his citizen birthright Executive Order until the Supreme Court decides whether it’s unconstitutional.
Nationwide injunctions have enjoined many of Trump’s unconstitutional Executive Orders that protected many people across the country who will no longer be protected if they didn’t have standing to sue.
Using similar tactics – blocking lower court injunctions until the Court can decide the issue at hand –, the Majority has ducked ruling definitively on Trump’s blatant abuses of executive power, such as drastically cutting the government workforce and financial assistance for domestic programs, freezing foreign and domestic aid, ending diversity programs, illegal impoundment of funds appropriated by Congress, intimidation of universities and media that Trump doesn’t like, illegal firing of public employees, illegal deportations, and illegal seizure of data by DOGE.
Now, nationwide injunctions that block unconstitutional Executive Orders will have to wait until the Constitutional issues are decided by the Supreme Court, which could take years. In the meanwhile, Trump can ignore all injunctions intended to apply to challengers who didn’t have standing to sue.
The majority’s holding is bound to lead to chaos as thousands of lawsuits with the same legal issues and similar facts have to arrive at the Supreme Court to finally be resolved.
Justice Sotomayer noted in her dissent that the Majority supported its holding by concluding that Trump is likely to succeed on the question of whether federal court injunctions can be enforced nation-wide even in the absence of any applicable precedent on the matter. The Majority also ignored the irreparable harm to children from sending them to hostile countries.
America’s confidence and trust in the Supreme Court depends on the belief that the Justices interpret the Constitution by honest reasoning unencumbered by partisanship. The Court earns that confidence by explaining their decisions clearly and in writing and proving to Americans that they are acting in accordance with law, precedent and their oaths of office, all of which they depart from.
Moreover, Decisions to enable presidential lawlessness have contributed to the growing public perception that the Majority is blatantly partisan, even possibly corrupt, which explains why confidence in the Court is at historical lows.
The capitulation by the Supreme Court is disheartening, even sickening. It’s the abandonment by America’s only remaining rudder to keep it on course.
