At least five conservative Supreme Court justices appeared ready to rule that President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting birthright citizenship may go into effect by limiting how federal district courts can issue universal nationwide injunctions on executive branch policies.
The Trump administration brought this case to the Supreme Court after dozens of federal district courts issued nationwide injunctions blocking Trump’s executive order, which would deny birthright citizenship to any child born to noncitizen parents in the United States. Instead of challenging the underlying legality or constitutionality of Trump’s order, the administration asked the Supreme Court to rule on whether district courts can issue universal nationwide injunctions at all.
This procedural question dominated arguments on Thursday, and it appeared that a majority of conservatives agreed, at least somewhat, with the Trump administration’s arguments against universal nationwide injunctions. If the court were to accept such an argument, it would allow Trump’s executive order rewriting the rules of birthright citizenship to go into effect for everyone except for the individual plaintiffs who sued and won at federal district courts.
