ICYMI – Supreme Court Killed Universal Injunctions in Name Only
On June 27, the Supreme Court handed President Donald Trump what he hailed as a “GIANT WIN,” finding that lower courts had “likely” overstepped in ordering universal injunctions blocking many of the president’s policies.
While the Court’s 6-3 opinion in Trump v. CASA appeared to disarm Trump’s opponents of perhaps their most potent legal weapon, his adversaries had other ideas.
In the weeks since, Trump’s challengers have seized on the ruling’s openings – especially the use of class-action suits in which a handful of plaintiffs may allege harm and seek relief on behalf of all similarly situated parties – to continue leveraging lower court judges to block the president’s orders.
Justices on both sides of the CASA decision identified several workarounds for plaintiffs seeking to broadly halt presidential policies – workarounds owing either to the narrowness of the courts’ ruling, or lower courts’ potential lack of fastidiousness to it.
Justice Alito, in a concurrence joined by Justice Thomas, highlighted the court’s silence on states’ ability to claim third-party standing and thereby bring suits on behalf of all of their residents in pursuit of unduly broad injunctions. Alito cautioned that should courts not engage in “rigorous and evenhanded enforcement of third-party-standing limitations,” it will undermine CASA “as a practical matter.”
Rep. Darrell Issa of the House Judiciary Committee, drafter of legislation to curtail universal injunction that passed in the lower chamber prior to the Supreme Court’s ruling, told RCI that he “share[s] Justice Alito’s concerns, which may prove not only precise, but prescient.”
These statements come as lower court judges have, in recent weeks, defied Supreme Court rulings and issued orders demanding the Trump administration defy Congress by paying out certain funds in contravention of the just-passed “One Big Beautiful Bill” – without explanation or allowing the administration to respond.
When asked whether he saw any checks on lower court overreach post-CASA, Rep. Issa said, “We are moving forward with our legislative solutions – the best kind of meaningful check.”
In the meantime, the Supreme Court has been playing whack-a-mole with lower courts. In response to perceived defiance of its jurisprudence in a recent case concerning the president’s power to remove independent agency leaders, Chief Justice John Roberts saw fit to emphasize – in siding with the Trump administration and overturning the lower courts – that the Supremes’ precedent “squarely control[s].”
Excerpts From RealClear Investigations, Article by Benjamin Weingarten, 7/31/2025, Supreme Court Killed Universal Injunctions in Name Only