In response to President Trump’s blizzard of executive orders and his all-out assault on government bureaucracy, federal judges around the country — especially in Washington — have issued rulings at a blistering rate for the past two months.
The decisions, much like Mr. Trump’s actions, have touched on an astonishing array of subjects: foreign aid, transgender rights and immigration, as well as whether the president can fire appointees at will, withhold spending mandated by Congress and authorize Elon Musk and his subordinates at the U.S. DOGE Service, or Department of Government Efficiency, to slash the federal work force.
While some rulings have gone the president’s way, taken as a whole, they represent an effort to push back at Mr. Trump’s serial attempts to increase his authority and the executive branch’s dominion over the government. They reflect a fraught and chaotic moment where so much seems uncertain and the federal government itself is under siege.
The Trump administration has appealed many, if not most, of the decisions, and a few have already been reversed by higher courts. More will certainly be revised or stricken down as the cases move through the judicial system.
But for now, here are key passages in several noteworthy rulings.
The president’s power to fire appointees
“A president who touts an image of himself as a ‘king’ or a ‘dictator,’ perhaps as his vision of effective leadership, fundamentally misapprehends the role under Article II of the U.S. Constitution. In our constitutional order, the president is tasked to be a conscientious custodian of the law, albeit an energetic one, to take care of effectuating his enumerated duties, including the laws enacted by the Congress and as interpreted by the judiciary.
“At issue in this case, is the president’s insistence that he has authority to fire whomever he wants within the executive branch, overriding any congressionally mandated law in his way. Luckily, the Framers, anticipating such a power grab, vested in Article III, not Article II, the power to interpret the law, including resolving conflicts about congressional checks on presidential authority. The president’s interpretation of the scope of his constitutional power — or, more aptly, his aspiration — is flat wrong.”
Judge Beryl A. Howell of Federal District Court for the District of Columbia, ruling that Mr. Trump does not have the authority to dismiss members of the National Labor Relations Board at will.
Birthright citizenship
“The loss of birthright citizenship — even if temporary, and later restored at the conclusion of litigation — has cascading effects that would cut across a young child’s life (and the life of that child’s family), very likely leaving permanent scars. The record before the court establishes that children born without a recognized or lawful status face barriers to accessing critical healthcare, among other services, along with the threat of removal to countries they have never lived in and possible family separation. That is irreparable harm.”
Judge Leo T. Sorokin of Federal District Court for the District of Massachusetts, ruling that Mr. Trump cannot enact an executive order effectively abolishing birthright citizenship.