The Supreme Court is handing the Trump administration a series of early victories as its policy agenda faces legal hurdles in the lower courts, signaling that the justices are increasingly willing to push back on overly broad procedural rulings from trial judges, particularly involving matters of immigration and executive authority.
In three decisions this week, the justices sided with the administration on major enforcement questions: deportations under the Alien Enemies Act, lower court orders demanding the return of deported alleged gang members, and the legality of mass firings across the federal workforce.
Conservative legal advocates and Trump allies have accused Democratic litigants of forum shopping — filing lawsuits in ideologically favorable districts to secure sweeping preliminary injunctions with little factual development. They argue that many of the legal challenges rely on plaintiffs who lack standing or are brought by interest groups with no direct connection to the affected policies.
In several ways, the Supreme Court vindicated Trump’s allies who have raged against judges that have shut down many of his cornerstone policies early into litigation with an overuse of temporary restraining orders or sweeping preliminary injunctions, many of which have gone into effect nationwide, in favor of the suing parties.
Though each ruling was narrowly tailored to avoid resolving the underlying constitutional questions, together, they chart a legal road map for Trump’s broader strategy to act boldly, let the courts catch up, and limit the ability of trial judges to halt action through expansive injunctions.
Supreme Court makes clear where deportation lawsuits can and can’t be filed
The consequences of the three rulings involve the administration’s invocation of the Alien Enemies Act, an 18th-century law originally designed for wartime use. On March 15, the Department of Homeland Security began deporting suspected members of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang to El Salvador.
That same day, U.S. District Judge James Boasberg in Washington, D.C., issued a temporary restraining order halting the removals in response to a class-action lawsuit challenging the administration’s use of the AEA for deportation purposes.
The Trump administration appealed to the Supreme Court, and on April 8, the justices lifted the restraining order in a 5-4 decision. The ruling did not endorse the administration’s interpretation of the Alien Enemies Act but rejected Boasberg’s jurisdiction, emphasizing that such habeas challenges must be filed in the jurisdiction where the detainees are held — not in D.C.
“This cannot happen in Washington, D.C.,” said Josh Hammer, senior counsel at the Article III Project, on One America News Network. “That is very good news insofar as this is going to get off the desk of this deeply anti-Trump, vehemently anti-rule of law, anti-immigration enforcement jurist, Judge Boasberg.”
ACLU quickly relaunches legal strategy in new jurisdictions
Following the Supreme Court’s Monday ruling, the American Civil Liberties Union refiled its legal challenges in appropriate venues.
In New York, Judge Alvin Hellerstein, an appointee of former President Bill Clinton, declined Wednesday to weigh in on the constitutionality of the Alien Enemies Act but ordered the government to notify Venezuelan detainees in his district and give them a chance to contest their gang designations before removal through at least April 22.
Just moments later, Texas Judge Fernando Rodriguez Jr., a Trump appointee, issued a temporary restraining order through at least April 23 blocking the deportation of Venezuelan migrants held in a South Texas detainment facility to El Salvador under the Alien Enemies Act. The ACLU of Texas filed that habeas petition just two days after the Supreme Court’s decision redirected such challenges to the jurisdictions where detainees are held.
While these new rulings temporarily block Trump’s efforts, they do not kneecap his broader deportation agenda. For starters, they are narrowly confined to the locations where these plaintiffs filed suit rather than Boasberg’s original order that banned the use of the AEA nationwide.
Trump can still use other deportation statutes under the Immigration Nationality Act or repatriation agreements between countries.
Roberts halts order to return deported MS-13 suspect
Another deportation-related case landed before the high court this week, involving Kilmar Abrego Garcia, an MS-13 suspect deported from Maryland in March.
A district judge ordered his return, finding the removal may have violated procedural protections. However, the Trump administration argued that such judicial orders would interfere with its foreign affairs powers and enforcement discretion.
Chief Justice John Roberts granted an emergency stay just hours before the court-imposed deadline, temporarily shielding the administration from having to reverse the deportation.
Critics had accused the district judge of overstepping judicial authority by issuing demands that required coordination with a foreign government, which the Trump administration has argued courts cannot do.
Experts say Supreme Court reined in ‘aggressive’ judges, address Barrett’s reluctance to join majority fully
These immigration rulings reflect what former Bush administration DOJ attorney John Yoo called a coordinated correction by the Supreme Court of judicial activism in the lower courts.
“The Supreme Court has tried to pull back these overly aggressive trial judges,” Yoo told Fox News on Wednesday. “Trial judges must be more modest in what they are allowed to do, and they have to be more respectful to the Trump administration and their agenda.”
Hammer and Yoo both addressed Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the most recent of Trump’s three high court appointees from his first term, for siding partially with the minority in the Alien Enemies Act ruling, joining Justice Sonia Sotomayor in a portion of her dissent.
“She continues to go wobbly,” Hammer said.
Yoo, however, noted Barrett’s procedural instincts might benefit the administration in the long run.
“She doesn’t like trial judges and the Supreme Court deciding everything quickly on these emergency motions. She really wants cases to get to the Supreme Court in an orderly, slow fashion,” Yoo said, noting she is very much still part of the conservative block given her numerous rulings in 6-3 decisions with Republican-appointed justices in the majority.
Justices give Trump favor on federal layoffs challenge
In a third Supreme Court decision on Tuesday, the justices ruled against two nonprofit groups that sued the administration over its Schedule F executive order, which led to the dismissal of over 16,000 probationary federal workers. At least five justices held that the groups lacked standing, as they failed to show direct harm from Trump’s executive action.
The ruling maintains the administration’s restructuring of the federal workforce and sets the bar higher for future procedural challenges from outside advocacy groups.
That high court decision was followed on Wednesday by a federal appeals court ruling in a related case brought by a coalition of Democratic attorneys general who had also challenged the mass firings. A divided three-judge panel on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals lifted a separate lower court order that had blocked many of the terminations, similarly concluding that the state plaintiffs likely lacked standing.
With both rulings now in place, no remaining legal barriers prevent the Trump administration from continuing to downsize the federal bureaucracy across nearly 20 major agencies.
“Here, the Court is sending yet another clear signal: challenges to the removal of federal employees should be brought through the usual channels at the [U.S. Merit Systems Protection Board] and not through a nationwide injunction,” South Texas College of Law professor Josh Blackman wrote for Reason‘s “The Volokh Conspiracy” blog.
However, the efforts by these federal employees are not yet over, according to a coalition that responded to the Tuesday decision. Blackman said there is a chance that “other plaintiffs may be able to establish standing, but that matter will have to wait for another day.”
“More likely than not, their cases are over,” he said.
Birthright citizenship case could be the next major test
For now, the Supreme Court has left the constitutional questions unresolved, including whether the Trump administration’s implementation of the AEA can ultimately survive constitutional muster.
But its recent decisions send a clear message: venue, standing to file a suit, and procedural discipline are important matters, and sweeping emergency injunctions will likely face more scrutiny than ever.
The administration may soon face another test at the high court over Trump’s birthright citizenship order, which four district courts have stopped from taking effect so far.
JUDGES TEMPORARILY BLOCK ALIEN ENEMIES ACT DEPORTATIONS IN DUEL CASES
Three petitions challenging birthright citizenship for the U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants are currently pending, and the justices are expected to decide soon whether to address if lower courts erred by imposing automatic stays on the administration’s efforts to curb birthright citizenship.
If the Supreme Court does act on these petitions, it will likely be yet another limited and procedural holding, such as whether to narrow the scope of the injunctions lower courts have placed on the president.