President Donald Trump has issued an avalanche of executive actions since returning to the White House, but not all of the actions have held up to initial judicial scrutiny.
While Trump has been successful with several of his actions, others have been struck down by federal courts. The Trump administration still has avenues to appeal all of the negative rulings, but these are the orders currently paused by the courts.
Ending Birthright citizenship
Trump issued an order on his first day in office declaring an end to birthright citizenship.
The order argued that “the Fourteenth Amendment has never been interpreted to extend citizenship universally to everyone born within the United States” and has “always excluded from birthright citizenship persons who were born in the United States but not “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.”
The president had teased the action in the months leading up to his return to the White House, and had previously floated attempting to end birthright citizenship in his first term.
Trump’s order was met with quick resistance, with lawsuits challenging its legality filed almost immediately. Several Democratic state attorneys general led the main lawsuit against the order. Three days after taking office, Senior U.S. District Judge John Coughenour issued a nationwide temporary restraining order halting the order and decried Trump’s action as “blatantly unconstitutional.”
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat who led the legal challenge against the order, heralded the Jan. 23 ruling as a “win for the rule of law and the U.S. Constitution.”
The Trump administration appealed the temporary restraining order to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, but were denied. His administration has appealed to the Supreme Court, who is considering whether to take up the case.
The Supreme Court has allowed states and organizations that have challenged the order until April 4 to submit responses to them.
Pausing foreign aid
Another executive order Trump signed on his first day in office paused foreign aid for the a 90-day period as it was reviewed to ensure it aligned with the administration’s goals and values.
“All department and agency heads with responsibility for United States foreign development assistance programs shall immediately pause new obligations and disbursements of development assistance funds to foreign countries and implementing non-governmental organizations, international organizations, and contractors pending reviews of such programs for programmatic efficiency and consistency with United States foreign policy, to be conducted within 90 days of this order,” the order said.
After the executive branch began executing Trump’s order to review foreign aid with the pause, various lawsuits challenged the pause. On Feb. 13, U.S. District Judge Amir Ali blocked the Trump administration from canceling all foreign contracts, ruling they had “not offered any explanation for why a blanket suspension of all congressionally appropriated foreign aid…was a rational precursor to reviewing programs.”
The plaintiffs in the case returned to Ali in the following weeks claiming that the Trump administration had not obeyed the court order to end the blanket halt. On Feb. 25, Ali gave the Trump administration one day to demonstrate that they were abiding by the ruling and had paid the nearly $2 billion in foreign aid to recipients and contractors for work completed through Feb. 13.
The Trump administration appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court, but in a 5-4 decision, the high court opted to allow the order to hold and require the payments for work completed.
In a later ruling on March 10, Ali ruled that the Trump administration needed to show the court proof of the $2 billion in payments within that week, but did not block the ability of the Trump administration to cancel future aid or contracts. Earlier that day, Secretary of State Marco Rubio had said after a six-week review it was canceling “83% of the programs at USAID” while maintaining the remaining roughly 1,000 programs under the State Department.
Banning transgender people from the armed forces
Trump issued an executive order on Jan. 27 banning transgender people from enlisting and serving in the Armed Forces, restoring a 2017 order during the president’s first term.
Transgender advocates denounced the efforts, with the Human Rights Campaign claiming that service members, including transgender people, “wear the same uniform, take the same oath, and meet the same rigorous standards.”
Opponents to the order sued in federal court in Washington, D.C., to have the order halted. On March 18, U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes blocked the order claiming that it discriminated against people based on their sex and transgender status.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth vowed to appeal to a decision a day later and said, “We will win.”
Invocation of Alien Enemies Act
The Alien Enemies Act of 1798 was one of the laws Trump had teased using for rapid deportation of illegal immigrants while on the campaign trail, and on March 15, he declared a proclamation invoking the legislation.
In the proclamation, Trump declared the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang is “perpetrating, attempting, and threatening an invasion or predatory incursion against the territory of the United States.”
“I proclaim that all Venezuelan citizens 14 years of age or older who are members of TdA, are within the United States, and are not actually naturalized or lawful permanent residents of the United States are liable to be apprehended, restrained, secured, and removed as Alien Enemies,” Trump said in the proclamation.
The president’s order came less than a month after he declared several cartels, including TdA, terrorist organizations. While Trump issued the long-anticipated proclamation on March 15, hours later, a federal judge blocked the order.
U.S. District Judge James Boasberg paused the order for 14 days, shortly after it was issued, arguing some of those deported under the order could face irreparable harm.
Despite the pause, the Trump administration had deported two flights of alleged Venezuelan gang members around the time of the court order. The White House denied it defied a court order because the “aliens had already been removed from U.S. territory” by the time the judge’s ruling was issued.
The White House has paused deportation flights for alleged Tren de Aragua members, but has vowed to challenge the court ruling, which White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt declared was “an egregious abuse of the bench.”
Ending contracts with Perkins Coie law firm
The president issued an executive order March 6 targeting Perkins Coie, a top Democratic-linked law firm. The order directed executive branch agencies to end federal contracts with the law firm and revoke security clearances given to staff of the law firm.
Trump claimed in the order the law firm had conducted in “dishonest and dangerous activity,” discussing its connections to pushing the Russia collusion claims during Trump’s first term. He has railed against the various unfounded claims levied against him during his prior stint in the White House about connections to Russia, alleging it was orchestrated by his 2016 election foe Hillary Clinton.
U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell halted the order, granting a temporary restraining order against the Trump administration for its plans to target the law firm. Howell claimed the order would have a chilling effect on law firms of “blizzard proportions” while claiming the action violated the law firm’s First, Fifth, and Sixth Amendment rights.
Suspension of refugee resettlement program
As part of Trump’s avalanche of executive orders on his first day back in office, the president signed an order pausing the refugee resettlement program for four months. Trump had made the flood of refugees entering the country a key campaign issue, discussing Springfield, Ohio, among other places during his run for a second term, and invoked those towns in his Jan. 20 order.
“The United States lacks the ability to absorb large numbers of migrants, and in particular, refugees, into its communities in a manner that does not compromise the availability of resources for Americans, that protects their safety and security, and that ensures the appropriate assimilation of refugees,” the order said. “This order suspends the USRAP until such time as the further entry into the United States of refugees aligns with the interests of the United States.”
The order sparked backlash from refugee advocacy groups, who fought against the order in federal court. The International Refugee Assistance Project, alongside various other groups, led the litigation against the executive order halting the program.
“The United States has a moral and legal obligation to protect refugees, and the longer this illegal suspension continues, the more dire the consequences will be,” Melissa Keaney, senior supervising attorney for U.S. Litigation at IRAP, said in a statement upon filing the lawsuit in February.
“Refugees and the families and communities waiting to welcome them have been thrown into indefinite limbo and the resettlement agencies ready to serve them don’t know if they can keep the lights on if the government continues to withhold critical funding,” Keaney added.
U.S. District Judge Judge Jamal Whitehead temporarily blocked the order on Feb. 25, decrying the executive action as “effective nullification of congressional will.”
Banning transgender surgeries for minors
Trump issued an order on Jan. 28 banning transgender surgeries and procedures for people under the age of 19. The order said the U.S. “will not fund, sponsor, promote, assist, or support the so-called “transition” of a child from one sex to another, and it will rigorously enforce all laws that prohibit or limit these destructive and life-altering procedures.”
The order came as several states have banned transgender surgeries for minors in recent years, and received pushback from transgender activists. The order was met with a challenge in court led by multiple Democratic state attorneys general and LGBT advocacy groups.
On Feb. 13, U.S. District Judge Brendan Hurson temporarily blocked the order and claimed not allowing these individuals to get the surgeries and procedures for those under 19 would be “horribly dangerous.”
The pause on the executive order was extended by U.S. District Judge Lauren King on March 1, with King accusing the Trump administration of having a “bare desire to harm.”
Placing transgender inmates by biological sex
One of the first executive orders Trump signed on Jan. 20 defined “sex” in the federal government as being based on biology, rather than gender identity. The order also included a provision to “ensure that males are not detained in women’s prisons or housed in women’s detention centers.”
Trump’s order was met with multiple lawsuits seeking to prevent moving biological males, who identified as women, to male prison quarters. One of the lawsuits filed by an LGBT advocacy group on behalf of a transgender inmate claimed the inmate would “experience irreparable injury” under the order.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth granted a temporary restraining order on Feb. 4 blocking the transfer of the biological male inmates out of female facilities and into male facilities, and from allowing the Trump administration to enforce the order.
LIST: THE EXECUTIVE ORDERS, ACTIONS, AND PROCLAMATIONS TRUMP HAS MADE AS PRESIDENT
Another well-known Trump executive order that was temporarily blocked pertained to ending support for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs within the government.
The order was initially blocked by U.S. District Judge Adam Abelson, but on March 14, a three judge federal appeals courts panel allowed the order to be enforced while the challenge to it plays out in the courts.