The Supreme Court on Friday narrowed the power of federal judges to issue nationwide injunctions, a tool that has frequently blocked major policies from both Republican and Democratic administrations.
The 6-3 decision arose from a legal challenge to President Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship.
Writing for the majority, Justice Amy Coney Barrett said such broad orders likely exceed the authority Congress granted to federal courts.
The Supreme Court said the Trump administration can partially implement the executive order as the case proceeds, but only where existing injunctions go beyond what is needed to fully protect the plaintiffs.
Justice Barrett emphasized that relief should be limited to those directly affected.
However, the court did not decide whether the order itself is constitutional.
“Some say that the universal injunction ‘give[s] the Judiciary a powerful tool to check the Executive Branch.’ But federal courts do not exercise general oversight of the Executive Branch; they resolve cases and controversies consistent with the authority Congress has given them,” Barrett wrote.
“When a court concludes that the Executive Branch has acted unlawfully, the answer is not for the court to exceed its power, too.”
In her dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor criticized the government’s stance, noting that it seeks to enforce the Citizenship Order—despite not defending its legality—against everyone except the specific plaintiffs in the case.
“The gamesmanship in this request is apparent and the Government makes no attempt to hide it. Yet, shamefully, this Court plays along,” Sotomayor wrote.
The ruling stemmed from three emergency appeals filed by the Trump administration over the president’s executive order aimed at ending birthright citizenship—the long-standing principle that anyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen, regardless of their parents’ immigration status.
Instead of quickly ruling on the Trump administration’s request for emergency relief, the Supreme Court chose to hear arguments on whether to limit the use of nationwide injunctions—broad judicial orders that block the government from enforcing a policy nationwide and against all individuals, not just the plaintiffs.
