‘Grave threat’: Liberal justice unleashes fury over ‘indefensible’ ruling

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor unleashed fury on her conservative colleagues for their decision overruling a lower court and giving the Trump administration the go-ahead to significantly slash the workforce of the Department of Education.

"That decision is indefensible," she wrote on Monday.

"When the Executive publicly announces its intent to break the law, and then executes on that promise, it is the Judiciary’s duty to check that lawlessness, not expedite it," she continued.

"Two lower courts rose to the occasion, preliminarily enjoining the mass firings while the litigation remains ongoing. Rather than maintain the status quo, however, this Court now intervenes, lifting the injunction and permitting the Government to proceed with dismantling the Department. That decision is indefensible. It hands the Executive the power to repeal statutes by firing all those necessary to carry them out. The majority is either willfully blind to the implications of its ruling or naive, but either way the threat to our Constitution’s separation of powers is grave. Unable to join in this misuse of our emergency docket, I respectfully dissent."

It was another decision along ideological lines with a 6-3 ruling.

According to Sotomayor, the Department of Education was established by Congress, and thus, only the legislative branch "has the power to abolish the Department.

Read the dissent here.