Latest news with #legalchallenges
Yahoo
16 hours ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Supreme Court gives Trump more power after ‘birthright citizenship' ruling curbs nationwide injunctions
The Supreme Court's conservative majority has stripped federal courts' authority to issue nationwide injunctions that have blocked key parts of Donald Trump's agenda. Friday's 6-3 ruling, written by Trump appointee Justice Amy Coney Barrett, states that federal judges went too far blocking his executive order that seeks to unilaterally redefine who gets to be a citizen. Those nationwide injunctions 'exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to the federal courts,' according to the ruling. The ruling opens the door for partial enforcement of Trump's executive order, putting thousands of American-born children at risk of being denied their constitutional rights. Trump's executive order will be blocked for another 30 days, however, allowing lower courts to revisit the scope of their injunctions and giving time for opponents to file new legal challenges. Department of Justice attorneys will now 'promptly file' legal challenges in cases where the president's executive actions were temporarily blocked, Trump told reporters at the White House. Moments after the ruling, plaintiffs filed a new lawsuit that would protect citizenship rights for all newborn Americans, not just in the states that initially sued. But the ruling does not definitively resolve challenges to birthright citizenship. A series of federal court rulings across the country earlier this year struck down the president's attempt to block citizenship from newborn Americans who are born to certain immigrant parents. The government argued those decisions should only impact the individual states — and the unborn children of pregnant mothers in them — who sued him and won. Opponents have warned that such a decision would open a backdoor to begin stripping away constitutional rights. In a blistering dissent, Justices Sonia Sotomayor called the court's ruling 'a travesty for the rule of law.' Allowing the president to unilaterally redefine who gets to be a U.S. citizen in states subject to Trump's rewriting of the 14th Amendment would create a patchwork system of constitutional rights and citizenship benefits — including voting rights. More than 150,000 newborns would be denied citizenship every year under Trump's order, according to the plaintiffs. 'Make no mistake: Today's ruling allows the Executive to deny people rights that the Founders plainly wrote into our Constitution, so long as those individuals have not found a lawyer or asked a court in a particular manner to have their rights protected,' Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote in her dissent. The court's decision gifted Trump the 'prerogative of sometimes disregarding the law' that opens the door to 'put both our legal system, and our system of government, in grave jeopardy,' Jackson warned. 'It is not difficult to predict how this all ends,' she wrote. 'Eventually, executive power will become completely uncontainable, and our beloved constitutional Republic will be no more." In January, more than 20 states, immigrants' advocacy groups and pregnant plaintiffs sued the administration to block the president's executive order. Three federal judges and appellate court panels argued his order is unconstitutional and blocked the measure from taking effect nationwide while legal challenges continue. During oral arguments, the Supreme Court's liberal justices appeared shocked at the president's 'unlawful' measure. But the administration used the case not necessarily to argue over whether he can change the 14th Amendment but to target what has become a major obstacle to advancing Trump's agenda: federal judges blocking aggressive executive actions. The government asked the court to limit the authority of federal judges to issue nationwide injunctions, which have imperilled a bulk of the president's agenda. In cases across the country, plaintiffs have pushed for injunctions as a tool for critical checks and balances against an administration that critics warn is mounting an ongoing assault against the rule of law. More than half of the injunctions issued over the last 70 years were against the Trump administration, according to the Harvard Law Review, as Trump pushed the limits of his authority. In arguments to the Supreme Court, Trump's personal attorney John Sauer, who was appointed by the president to serve as U.S. solicitor general, called the 'cascade of universal injunctions' against the administration a 'bipartisan problem' that exceeds judicial authority. Trump's allies, however, have relied on nationwide injunctions to do the very same thing they commanded the Supreme Court to strike down. Critics have accused right-wing legal groups of 'judge shopping' for ideologically like-minded venues where they can sue to strike down — through nationwide injunctions — policies with which they disagree. After the government's arguments fell flat in front of a mostly skeptical Supreme Court last month, Trump accused his political opponents of 'playing the ref' through the courts to overturn his threat to the 14th Amendment. The 14th Amendment plainly states that 'all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.' For more than 100 years, the Supreme Court has upheld the definition to apply to all children born within the United States. But under the terms of Trump's order, children can be denied citizenship if a mother is undocumented or is temporarily legally in the country on a visa, and if the father isn't a citizen or a lawful permanent resident. The president's attempt to redefine citizenship is central to his administration's sweeping anti-immigration agenda. His administration has also effectively ended entry for asylum seekers; declared the United States under 'invasion' from foreign gangs to summarily remove alleged members; and stripped legal protections for more than 1 million people — radically expanding the pool of 'undocumented' people now vulnerable for arrest and removal. The administration 'de-legalised' tens of thousands of immigrants, and thousands of people with pending immigration cases are being ordered to court each week only to have those cases dismissed, with federal agents waiting to arrest them on the other side of the courtroom doors. The White House has also rolled back protections barring immigration arrests at sensitive locations like churches and bumped up the pace of immigration raids in the interior of the country. To carry out the arrests, the administration has tapped resources from other state and local agencies while moving officers from federal agencies like the FBI and DEA to focus on immigration. There are more people in immigration detention centers today than in any other point in modern history.
Bloomberg
18 hours ago
- Politics
- Bloomberg
Supreme Court Curbs Nationwide Blocks in Birthright Fight
A sharply divided US Supreme Court limited the power of judges to block government policies nationwide, but left a fight over President Donald Trump's restrictions on automatic birthright citizenship unresolved. The 6-3 ruling said Trump's restrictions on birthright citizenship won't take effect for 30 days. The justices returned the cases to the lower courts to let judges consider whether to again block the rules — at least in part of the country if not the whole nation — in challenges pressed by a group of states.
Washington Post
07-06-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Trump administration weighs broad cancellation of California funding
The Trump administration is considering pulling a broad swath of federal funding from the state of California, according to two federal officials familiar with the plan and records obtained by The Washington Post. The plan could run afoul of an existing federal court injunction and would almost certainly face fresh legal challenges. A senior White House official stressed Saturday that no final decision on blocking the funds has been made.
Washington Post
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Washington Post
Trump banned travel from 12 countries, but included some exceptions to avoid legal battles
MIAMI — The new travel ban on citizens of 12 countries that restricted access to people from seven others includes some exceptions, part of the administration's efforts to withstand the legal challenges that a similar policy known as the 'Muslim ban' faced during Donald Trump's first administration. The ban announced Wednesday applies to people from Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The restrictions are for people from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela, who are outside the United States and don't hold a visa.
Associated Press
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Associated Press
Trump banned travel from 12 countries, but included some exceptions to avoid legal battles
MIAMI (AP) — The new travel ban on citizens of 12 countries that restricted access to people from seven others includes some exceptions, part of the administration's efforts to withstand the legal challenges that a similar policy known as the 'Muslim ban' faced during Donald Trump's first administration. The ban announced Wednesday applies to people from Afghanistan, Myanmar, Chad, the Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen. The restrictions are for people from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela, who are outside the United States and don't hold a visa. Some exceptions apply only to specific countries, like Afghanistan. Others are for most of the countries on the list, or are more general and unclear, like the policies for foreign visitors planning to come to the U.S. for the 2026 World Cup and 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, two of the events President Donald Trump has said he is more excited to host. Some experts agree that the current ban includes exceptions and has fixed some issues that were subject to litigation in the first travel ban. 'Absolutely, the administration is trying to avoid the problems that they had with the first proclamation,' said Jeff Joseph, president-elect at the American Immigration Lawyers Association. He anticipated, nonetheless, that lawsuits are 'going to come anyway.' In one of the most confusing moments of his first administration, Trump issued an executive order in 2017 banning travel to the U.S. by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries, including Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. People from those countries were barred from getting on flights to the U.S. or detained at U.S. airports after landing. Among them were students, faculty, businesspeople, tourists and people visiting family. The order, dubbed as 'Muslim ban' by critics, faced legal challenges in the courts for about a year and was amended twice after opponents argued in the courts that it was unconstitutional and illegal. A version of the first travel ban was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2018. The new ban takes effect Monday at 12 a.m. It does not have an end date. Who is exempt from the new travel ban? __Green card holders __Dual citizens, including U.S. citizens who have citizenship of the banned countries __Some athletes and their coaches traveling to the U.S. for the World Cup, Olympics or other major sporting events __Afghans who worked for the U.S. government or its allies in Afghanistan or are holders of special visas __Iranians from an ethnic or religious minority who are fleeing prosecution __Certain foreign national employees of the U.S. government that have served abroad for at least 15 years, and their spouses and children __People who were granted asylum or admitted to the U.S. as refugees before the travel ban took effect __People with U.S. family members who apply for visas in connection with their spouses, children or parents __Diplomats and foreign government officials on official visits __People traveling to the U.N. headquarters in New York on official U.N. business __Representatives of international organizations and NATO on official visits in the United States __Children adopted by U.S. citizens Trump said nationals of the countries included in the ban pose 'terrorism-related' and 'public safety' risks, as well as risks of overstaying their visas. Some of these countries, he said, had 'deficient' screening or have refused to take back their citizens. The Proclamation includes exceptions for lawful permanent residents, existing visa holders, certain visa categories and individuals whose entry serves U.S. national interests. What is different from the 2017 ban? Critics of the 2017 ban said that it was racial and targeted Muslim countries. Now the policy is broader and includes countries like Cuba, Haiti and Venezuela — nations that don't have many Muslims. This will make the argument about racial animus, said Joseph, the immigration attorney. The government has also included potential end dates, and the State Department will evaluate the proclamation every 90 days and determine if it should be extended. Is the list final, or could it be changed? The list can be changed, the administration said in a document, if authorities in the designated countries make 'material improvements' to their own rules and procedures. New countries can be added 'as threats emerge around the world.' Exemptions for Afghans The travel ban has barred most Afghans hoping to resettle in the U.S. permanently and those hoping to come temporarily, but there are several exemptions. One of them is for special immigrant visa holders who supported the United States' two-decades-long war in Afghanistan. Another exception applies to all countries on the travel ban and allows spouses, children and parents of U.S. citizens to enter the U.S. The U.S. government can decide to admit or decline their entrance on a case-by-case basis, considering if they serve a 'United States national interest.' How does it affect the World Cup, Olympics and fans? Iran, a soccer power in Asia, is the only targeted country to qualify so far for the World Cup that will be co-hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico next year. Cuba, Haiti and Sudan are in contention. Sierra Leone might stay involved through multiple playoff games. Burundi, Equatorial Guinea and Libya have very outside shots. But all should be able to send teams if they qualify because the new policy makes exceptions for 'any athlete or member of an athletic team, including coaches, persons performing a necessary support role, and immediate relatives, traveling for the World Cup, the Olympics, or other major sporting event as determined by the secretary of state.' About 200 countries could send athletes to the Summer Games, including those targeted in the travel restrictions, and the exceptions should apply to them if the ban is still in place in its current form. Fans from the target countries willing to travel to the World Cup and the Olympics are not mentioned in the exceptions. Traveling from abroad for the World Cup and the Summer Games is expensive. In many cases, those who can afford the travel are wealthy individuals or people living in the diaspora, who may have different visa options. ___
