The US Supreme Court on Tuesday lifted a lower court’s block on President Donald Trump’s executive order directing federal agencies to prepare for sweeping reductions in the federal workforce.
The unsigned opinion from the Court grants the Trump Administration the ability to move forward with the executive order while legal challenges continue. The ruling doesn’t end the dispute over the authority of the executive branch to carry out large-scale reductions in force without congressional approval, but it signals that the justices believe the Trump Administration is likely to succeed on the merits of the case.
The executive order in question was issued by President Trump in February, to “promptly undertake preparations to initiate large-scale reductions in force (RIFs), consistent with applicable law.” The administration followed up with a memorandum from the Office of Management and Budget and the Office of Personnel Management to begin implementation.
Labor unions, advocacy groups, and several local governments filed suit in federal court, challenging the legality of the move and requesting an injunction to halt it. Senior US District Judge Susan Illston of San Francisco granted a preliminary injunction blocking implementation and required the government to provide planning documents related to the reductions.
When the US Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit refused to lift the injunction, Solicitor General D. John Sauer appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that the injunction caused “ongoing and severe harm” to the government by interfering with the internal operations of the executive branch.
In its two-paragraph decision, the Supreme Court stated that Judge Illston’s injunction rested on a legal conclusion that the executive order and accompanying memorandum were unlawful. The majority, however, found that the government was likely correct in arguing that both documents are legal. Based on that conclusion and the other criteria, the Court put Illston’s ruling on hold. The Administration may move forward while the 9th Circuit appeal continues.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor concurred, noting that the executive order explicitly calls for plans that comply with existing law.
But Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson issued a 15-page dissent that said that the lower court’s injunction served as a temporary, harm-reducing measure while the legality of the executive order is assessed.
Jackson warned that allowing the order to proceed unchecked “permits an apparently unprecedented and congressionally unsanctioned dismantling of the Federal Government to continue apace, causing irreparable harm before courts can determine whether the President has the authority to engage in the actions he proposes.”
Drawing from her own experience as a former district court judge, Jackson made the nearly comical stretch that the lower court is best equipped to determine the actual scale and legal implications of the executive action. She concluded that the Supreme Court is just unable to do the job: “This Court lacks the capacity to fully evaluate, much less responsibly override, reasoned lower court fact finding.”
For now, the decision is a major victory for the Trump Administration as it seeks to reshape the size and structure of the federal government.
My former father-in-law just happened to be a business agent for a laborers union back east. He tried to argue with me that the size of government has no effect on our tax burden. His go to was that they pay taxes too. Talk about toeing the line.
I guess I was a little late to learn, never waste time debating with a fool.
Wow what a great story.
I am absolutely sure the tax burden imposed by a Federal government employee far exceeds the amount they pay in taxes. If it were even close, the take home pay for a federal worker would be close to zero.
More winning. Another smackdown of activist liberal judges. Now, if only they could lose their jobs to this insane practice. Would that be asking to much?
Truth. GWB appointed Judge Cormac Carney in California was forced out of his leadership position in 2020 for as little as praising a black clerk as ‘street-smart’. The right needs to return the favor and seek to remove all suspected leftists from the judiciary. When leftists wet themselves about it, remind them that they threw the first punch – and to take their meds.
Trump is setting a great example by bringing federal charges against the female Wisconsin judge that was obstructing ICE by smuggling illegal aliens out of her courtroom. If prison time for leftist judges isn’t winning, I don’t know what is.
Yahoo!!!
Another Big Beautiful Win.
The Last President to carry out reductions in the Federal workforce was none other than Clinton a Democrat and we didn’t see all this suing to stop it. Hypocrisy at its finest.
First axiom of politics.
“It is not the action taken by the individual that causes the offense. It is the political affiliation of the person taking action that causes the offense.”
It’s because Clinton did it over the course of 7 years and after careful analysis. Trump is doing this just to traumatize people and it’s pretty clear that many on here take joy in that.
While Clinton did reduce the number of Federal employees over a much longer timeframe, I did not see the “careful analysis.” In fact, it was more of a movement of the work from Federal Employees to Federal Contract Support workers.
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Now, I do agree. The Trump approach is more of one business taking over another, and the layoffs are based on seniority, not skills. Then again, companies have been doing that for centuries, and have come out just fine the overwhelming majority of the time.
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If you were to ask any agency, or any supervisor for that matter, if they are overstaffed, what do you think the answer will be? I doubt you will get a single ‘yes’ answer. That is why I know, Clinton did not do a careful analysis. It would have provided the same results.
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And, assuming malice on the part of President Trump is a losing argument. The President is doing what every other CEO has done when the workforce exceeds the requirement. Cutting it in whatever manner they can. Yeah… it sucks to lose your job, especially when the person who kept theirs is a lazyass (personal experience here), but it is reality. The CEOs of the companies that I worked for did not cut staff out of malice, they did it out of a necessity to keep the company afloat.
Your funny. It’d called cutting the fat. Time to get rid of the redundancy of the federal work force welfare system.
Trump started the reduction in the Federal workforce in 2017 and continues today so in essence he his doing the same thing as Clinton. What he has that Clinton did not is expertise in business. For 36 years both in the Armed Services and working as a civilian I have watched deadbeats in government service that should not be working for the government so to say that these reductions are not needed is both untruthful and shows ignorance on the efficiency of government.
I spent 30 years in the federal workforce and saw maybe 2 people I would classify as deadbeats. I spent about 10 years in the private sector and saw more than my share of lazy. The meme that somehow federal employees are all lazy is just plain false.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote “This Court lacks the capacity to fully evaluate, much less responsibly override, reasoned lower court fact finding.”
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson should resign immediately since she clearly has zero understanding of the role or duty she has been installed to perform.
But you’re more aware than a member of the Supreme Court? Right.
I know inert carbon rods that are more aware than Justice Jackson.
Well, then one wonders why you’re not on the Supreme Court instead of her? What with your extensive knowledge of jurisprudence.
I didn’t fit the only important and predetermined “black woman” qualification that Biden made in an effort to make up for his racist past. When Biden was a senator, he warned President George W. Bush that if he nominated the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court, he would filibuster and kill her nomination. So he made a promise to get votes by nominating a black woman who admits to not understanding the very basics of the cases in front of her, how the law works, or the role of the Supreme Court and her place on it.
I am not a lawyer in any way. However, I may be a black lesbian, so I guess I would be qualified. Perhaps even more qualified than Justice Jackson. After all, I got that third box checked.
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And, I only have her written opinions to … wait for it… base my assessment on. And, frankly, they are emotional blather with little actual legal content. Even an abject layman can tell that.
Absolutely 100 percent no doubt about it. Seeing as Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson clearly doesn’t understand the US Constitution or how the judicial branch of our government functions, there is zero doubt that I am more aware than she is.
But don’t believe me, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson has been telling us for years she does not understand
‘https://x.com/SteveGuest/status/1942675369922027689
And don’t believe her either, Justice Sonia Sotomayor had to point out some basic facts about the case to Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson by reminding her that “Here, however, the relevant Executive Order directs agencies to plan reorganizations and reductions in force ‘consistent with applicable law’ … and the resulting joint memorandum from the Office of Management and Budget and Office of Personnel Management reiterates as much.” And that “large-scale reductions in force (RIFs), consistent with applicable law” Because the court is not considering the legality of those plans she let Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson in on this little tidbit “we thus have no occasion to consider whether they can and will be carried out consistent with the constraints of law,” and that the course of action was to allow the district court “to consider those questions in the first instance.”
In here own words, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson just does not understand.