STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
The United States Supreme Court, last hour, issued an opinion limiting the power of federal courts to issue nationwide injunctions. It's a 6-3 decision, which fell along ideological lines, and the majority sided with the Trump administration in what had been one of the most highly anticipated cases of this year. At issue here was how lower courts should handle President Trump's executive order on birthright citizenship. We should note that the court seems not directly to have ruled on that at all but did rule on a challenge to a nationwide injunction by a district court judge which blocked the Trump administration from unilaterally limiting birthright citizenship. NPR's Carrie Johnson is with us now in studios. In a moment, we'll hear from NPR's Nina Totenberg, who was at the Supreme Court. And we'll begin with Carrie. Carrie, what's the significance of this ruling?
CARRIE JOHNSON, BYLINE: You know, President Trump has already, on social media, called this a giant win for him, and it's hard to disagree. This conservative supermajority, led by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, found these so-called universal injunctions likely exceed the power that Congress has given federal courts. And because Trump has used so much executive action, including executive orders, to advance his agenda in immigration and remaking the federal workforce and so many other things, this decision by the court could make it harder for lower court judges to act as a check on Trump's use of executive power in that way.
INSKEEP: Let's talk about a little bit of the context here. As I recall, justices during oral arguments and lawyers during oral arguments pointed out that administrations from both political parties have had trouble with judges in the past in this way.
JOHNSON: Absolutely. Obama administration, Biden administration folks, as well as Trump administration folks, have been bedeviled by this idea that a single judge somewhere in the country could put a block on an administration policy nationwide. And now the Supreme Court majority seems to have made that a lot harder to do.
INSKEEP: OK. Let's bring in now NPR's Nina Totenberg, who's been reading the decision at the U.S. Supreme Court. Nina, welcome. We, of course, have heard some of the basics from Carrie and through the morning with our live coverage. But as you read the decision, what stands out to you?
NINA TOTENBERG, BYLINE: What stands out to me is that, for a second year in a row, the Supreme Court of the United States has given all presidents - at the moment, President Trump - enormous protection to do what he wants. Last year, it was, for all practical purposes, immunity from prosecution, even after leaving office. And this year, this president, who has issued so many executive orders, far more than anybody else, is - there is language in this opinion that a defers to those executive orders. Until cases are litigated, an individual plaintiffs or individual organizations can get redress that they want to get. And so...
INSKEEP: I want to bring in Carrie Johnson just very briefly, and then we'll finish out with Nina. But when we talk about individual plaintiffs, Carrie, how is that different from what was happening yesterday or a few months ago in the matter of birthright citizenship?
JOHNSON: Well, in a lot of cases, people whose immigration status was being contested or who were being disadvantaged in some way by these executive orders could rely on an individual judge to block a policy from taking effect all over the country universally. And now, as a result of this Supreme Court decision today by the conservative supermajority, it will, in essence, require people to go to court one by one in order to get that same relief. The exception is with respect to state. Because birthright issues and the birth of children is such an important process and it involves a lot of state power and state action, it's possible the states could still get some relief for themselves.
INSKEEP: Nina Totenberg, what are the likely effects of this change of the rules? - or not change of the rules. The court perhaps would say clarification of them.
TOTENBERG: Well, as Justice Sotomayor said in her dissent, if there ever was a case in which you needed a nationwide injunction, it would be a case involving birthright citizenship, because if babies born in the United States don't have automatic birthright citizenship while this case is litigated and only the individuals and groups that brought the case have that benefit, the president, at least for a time - as much as six months or more - can enforce his executive order that says, when you're born in the United States and your parents aren't here legally, you do not get birthright citizenship. And he can say, as he did in his executive order, if you're born in the United States and your parents are here legally but on a temporary, for example, work visa, you do not get automatic citizenship. So this is going to be a huge conundrum.
The court does leave open the possibility that all over the country, they could start assembling class actions and try to protect people that way, and that states can get into the act. But you're talking about quite a cauldron of legal stuff going on. Justice Sotomayor wrote, the president's mandate to exercise his executive power, in any event, does not permit him - this is her dissent - to rewrite the Constitution or statutory provisions at a whim by forging ahead and granting relief to the government. And anyway, this court endorses the radical proposition that the president is harmed irreparably when he cannot do something that he wants to do, even if what he wants to do is to break the law.
INSKEEP: NPR's Nina Totenberg, thanks so much. And, Carrie Johnson, thanks to you for your coverage throughout this morning. And I want to mention that President Trump is expected to speak live in the next few minutes at the White House, and we will have live Special Coverage of that. So stick with us throughout the morning here on MORNING EDITION and with NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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