The Supreme Court is on the brink of hearing a case with huge ramifications for the legal battles going on at all levels against President Donald Trump's administration and beyond, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
The case in question is Trump v. CASA, which involves the dispute over Trump's executive order summarily reinterpreting the Fourteenth Amendment to eliminate birthright citizenship in the United States. Lower courts have already ripped Trump's order to shreds, but he wants the Supreme Court to do more than just let him go ahead with the order — he also wants them to limit courts' ability to even issue nationwide injunctions against his orders going forward.
"Mr. Trump seeks to stay three injunctions, issued by judges in Maryland, New Jersey and Washington state, 'except as to the individual plaintiffs and identified members of the organizational plaintiffs or states,'" wrote James Taranto for WSJ. It's possible the court could reject this, or they could simply do as Trump instructs and leave it at that. But "if they also prohibit or set limits on nationwide injunctions, CASA will be one of the most important cases of the term."
Another possibility, Taranto wrote, is that "the justices will return a split decision — for Mr. Trump on nationwide injunctions, against him on birthright citizenship."
EXCLUSIVE: Breastfeeding mom of US citizen sues Kristi Noem after being grabbed by ICE
Taranto spoke with James Ho, a far-right Fifth Circuit judge, former Clarence Thomas law clerk, and Trump appointee who himself wants nationwide injunctions against Trump limited. Ho argued that essentially, until they are reined in, district court judges are some of the most powerful people in the United States other than the president.
“District judges are unique in our judicial system,” said Ho. “They are the only members of the federal judiciary that can exercise the judicial power of the United States unilaterally — all by themselves — without anyone else having to agree with them.” Appeals courts can overturn them, he noted, but are limited in the scope of how they can review the decision and individual judges cannot do anything without a consensus of their panel.
“In high-school civics class, we’re told that the three branches of government are separate and coequal,” said Ho. “I think that’s wrong. The judiciary is not coequal. The judiciary is the weakest branch. All we have is our voice. All we can do is issue judgments. Whether those judgments are respected, whether they’re enforced, requires the respect of the other branches.” And judges will only keep that respect, he added, by “following the law themselves.”
