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Wednesday, July 2, 2025
Friday, the United States Supreme Court handed down a 6-3 decision stating that U.S. federal judges may not issue nationwide injunctions. The case at hand concerned an executive order issued by U.S. President Donald Trump that limited federal recognition of birthright citizenship in certain cases, which three federal judges countermanded earlier this year via nationwide injunctions. The justices wrote in the majority opinion that they were ruling on the authority of federal courts to issue nationwide injunctions, not on the constitutionality of the executive order itself.
All six conservative justices voted to limit federal judges’ authority to issue injunctions that apply nationwide. All three liberal members dissented.
The term “nationwide injunction” is not defined in statute. According to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), the term is generally used to describe an injunction that prevents the government from enforcing a policy against anyone, not just the parties to the case. According to the CRS, federal judges have issued nationwide injunctions stopping 25 of Trump’s executive orders covering such issues as his firing of Federal government employees and his opposition to diversity and equity programs. The BBC reports that both Democratic and Republican presidents have criticized the practice, arguing that individual judges should not have the power to block executive actions or legislation on a nationwide scale. Because these rulings were nationwide injunctions, they applied to whole classes of people even though the lawsuits were not class action lawsuits.
The specific case before the Court concerned nationwide injunctions stopping an executive order concerning birthright citizenship. On January 20, President Trump signed an executive order declaring that states must stop issuing American birth certificates to children whose parents entered the United States illegally or were otherwise not permanent residents. Twenty-two states and several other organizations sued the Trump Administration to stop the executive branch of the U.S. government from enforcing this order. The federal courts’ nationwide injunctions allowed the states to continue processing birth certificates as usual while the various court cases made their way through the American legal system. Because they were nationwide injunctions, these decisions applied to all 50 states, not only to the states and other plaintiffs that sued.
The majority decision in Friday’s case, authored by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, stated that federal judges do not have the authority to issue nationwide injunctions when they find that the executive branch of the United States’ government has exceeded its authority or broken the law. Instead, the judges’ decisions must apply only to the plaintiffs who brought the case before them:
“Universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts,” reads the opinion. “The Court grants the Government’s applications for a partial stay of the injunctions entered below, but only to the extent that the injunctions are broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff with standing to sue.”
The majority opinion specifically stated that the Court was not taking a position on the constitutionality of the Trump Administration’s actions, only on the constitutionality of the federal courts’. In other words, the Justices were not saying which way they would rule if the issue of birthright citizenship reached the Supreme Court in some other case. The Court also ruled that the Trump Administration’s order on these birth certificates must not take effect for thirty days from Friday. According to NPR, this is to give such cases time to reach them.
The executive order regarding citizenship, signed January 20, reads, “It is the policy of the United States that no department or agency of the United States government shall issue documents recognizing United States citizenship, or accept documents issued by State, local, or other governments or authorities purporting to recognize United States citizenship, to persons (1) when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth, or (2) when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States was lawful but temporary, and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth.”
This executive order contradicts a longstanding U.S. policy of birthright citizenship. This policy was established with the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution after the American Civil War specifically to deal with the legal status of former slaves and their descendants. Since then, it has been interpreted to mean that anyone born on U.S. soil is a U.S. citizen. The Supreme Court upheld this interpretation in 1898 and again in 1982, and Congress codified it in the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. The Trump Administration, however, argues that birthright citizenship does not apply if both parents entered the U.S. illegally. NPR calls this interpretation of the amendment and legal precedent a “fringe view.”
According to Attorney General Pam Bondi, “Americans are finally getting what they voted for.”
United States Senator Peter Welch of Vermont told the press: “President Trump’s Supreme Court has decided to limit lower courts’ ability to hold him accountable. Let’s be clear: this is another instance of the Court bending over backwards to insulate this administration from any restraint on its power.”
Trump, posted on Truth Social: “GIANT WIN.”
- Nina Totenberg. Supreme Court limits nationwide injunctions in birthright citizenship order — NPR, June 27, 2025
- Michael Casey. Court’s ruling on nationwide injunctions ‘smacks of hypocrisy,’ US senator says — Associated Press, June 27, 2025
- Anthony Zurcher. Top court ruling expands Trump’s power – and he intends to use it — BBC, June 27, 2025
- Press Release. The Executive Order on Birthright Citizenship is Unconstitutional — New York Bar Association, March 6, 2025
- District Court Reform: Nationwide Injunctions: Chapter Four — Harvard Law Review, April 2024
- The White House. Presidential Actions: PROTECTING THE MEANING AND VALUE OF AMERICAN CITIZENSHIP — The White House, January 20, 2025
- Nationwide Injunctions: Recent Legal Developments — Congressional Research Service, Legal Sidebar, December 2, 2021 (PDF)
