US Supreme Court Limits Nationwide Injunctions by Federal Courts in Landmark Birthright Citizenship Ruling
Court sidesteps constitutional validity for now; legality of Trump’s impugned executive order on birthright citizenship remains undecided.
By Karan Bir Singh Sidhu
Retired IAS Officer, Former Special Chief Secretary (Punjab)
KBS Sidhu is a former senior civil servant and constitutional analyst. He writes on law, governance, federalism, and public policy with a focus on constitutional justice and institutional accountability.
US Supreme Court’s Interim Directions in Landmark Birthright Citizenship Case
The Supreme Court of the United States today (June 27, 2025) delivered a significant, albeit interim, boost to President Donald Trump, in its first major ruling addressing his administration's controversial executive order attempting to end birthright citizenship. While the Apex Court did not directly rule on the constitutionality of Trump's citizenship directive, it fundamentally reshaped the power of federal judges to block presidential policies nationwide through what are known as universal or nationwide injunctions.
The Supreme Court's Historic Decision
In a 6-3 decision that split along ideological lines, Justice Amy Coney Barrett authored the majority opinion limiting the authority of individual federal district court judges to issue sweeping orders that prevent government policies from being enforced across the entire nation. The Apex Court ruled that such "universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has granted to federal courts."
The majority opinion emphasized that "federal courts do not exercise general oversight of the Executive Branch; they resolve cases and controversies consistent with the authority Congress has given them." Barrett wrote pointedly, "When a court concludes that the Executive Branch has acted unlawfully, the answer is not for the court to exceed its power, too."
The ruling granted the Federal Government's applications for partial stays of the preliminary injunctions, but "only to the extent that the injunctions are broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff with standing to sue." This means that the lower court decisions can only prevent Trump's order from affecting the 22 Democratic-led states, expectant mothers, and immigration advocacy groups who were actual parties to the lawsuits.
Trump's Executive Order on Birthright Citizenship
President Trump signed Executive Order 14160, titled "Protecting the Meaning and Value of American Citizenship," on his first day back in office, January 20, 2025. The order represented a bold challenge to over 150 years of constitutional interpretation regarding the 14th Amendment's Citizenship Clause.
The executive order identified two specific circumstances where children born on U.S. soil would not automatically receive citizenship:
When the mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the father was neither a U.S. citizen nor a lawful permanent resident at the time of birth
When the mother was in the United States on temporary status (such as student, work, or tourist visas) and the father was neither a U.S. citizen nor a lawful permanent resident at the time of birth
The order directed federal agencies to stop issuing documents recognizing U.S. citizenship to children born after February 19, 2025, who fall into these categories. According to legal challenges, Trump's directive would result in over 150,000 newborns being denied citizenship annually.
Immediate Legal Challenges and Lower Court Response
The executive order faced swift and widespread legal opposition. Within days of its issuance, at least ten lawsuits were filed by various plaintiffs, including 22 state attorneys general, civil liberties organizations, immigrants' rights groups, and pregnant women.
Three federal district court judges issued particularly strong rebukes of Trump's order. U.S. District Court Judge John Coughenour in Washington State called the order "blatantly unconstitutional" and issued a 14-day restraining order. Judge Deborah Boardman in Maryland issued a preliminary injunction, stating that "The United States Supreme Court has resoundingly rejected the president's interpretation of the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment. In fact, no court in the country has ever endorsed the president's interpretation. This court will not be the first."
A judge in Maryland similarly blocked the order, noting that Trump's proposal "contradicts our nation's 250-year tradition of citizenship by birth." These judges issued what are called "universal" or "nationwide" injunctions, preventing the Trump administration from enforcing the policy anywhere in the country.
Constitutional Foundation and Legal Precedent
The legal challenges centered on the 14th Amendment's Citizenship Clause, which states: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside." This amendment was ratified in 1868 in the aftermath of the Civil War to overturn the Supreme Court's infamous Dred Scott decision and ensure citizenship for formerly enslaved people.
The interpretation of birthright citizenship was definitively established in the landmark 1898 Supreme Court case United States v. Wong Kim Ark. In that case, the Court ruled 6-2 that Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco to Chinese parents who were not U.S. citizens, was indeed a U.S. citizen by virtue of his birth on American soil. The Court held that citizenship as prescribed in the 14th Amendment extends to U.S.-born children of foreign nationals who are permanent residents and conducting business in the United States.
The Wong Kim Ark precedent has remained established law for over 125 years, with legal experts across the political spectrum maintaining that the 14th Amendment unequivocally extends birthright citizenship to anyone born in the United States, regardless of their parents' immigration status.
The Trump Administration's Strategic Approach
Rather than directly challenging the constitutionality of birthright citizenship—a battle that would have faced overwhelming legal precedent—the Trump administration pursued a more tactical approach. The Justice Department focused on the narrower procedural question of whether individual federal district court judges possess the authority to issue nationwide injunctions that block presidential policies across the entire country.
This strategy proved shrewd, as it allowed the administration to secure a significant victory without having the Supreme Court directly rule against the substance of Trump's citizenship order. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi celebrated the ruling on social media, stating: "Today, the Supreme Court instructed district courts to STOP the endless barrage of nationwide injunctions against President Trump."
The administration's emergency appeals to the Supreme Court argued that the lower courts had exceeded their authority and that such broad injunctions promote forum shopping and inappropriate judicial interference with executive authority. They requested that injunctions be limited to apply only to the specific parties who brought the lawsuits.
Nationwide Injunctions: A Growing Controversy
The Supreme Court's decision addressed a practice that has become increasingly controversial across the political spectrum. Nationwide injunctions have grown more common in recent decades, with both liberal and conservative litigants using them to halt policies from presidents of both parties.
Justice Barrett noted in her majority opinion that "by the end of the Biden administration, we had reached 'a state of affairs where almost every major presidential act [was] immediately frozen by a federal district court.'" She further observed that "during the first 100 days of the second Trump administration, district courts issued approximately 25 universal injunctions."
Legal experts across ideological lines have expressed concerns about nationwide injunctions, arguing they promote forum shopping, politicization of the judiciary, and allow single judges to effectively set national policy. However, other experts maintain that such injunctions are necessary in rare cases to protect civil liberties throughout the country and avoid a patchwork of conflicting judicial rulings.
The Court's decision reflects longstanding frustration from both Democratic and Republican administrations with the practice. The majority opinion noted that "U.S. solicitors general—on multiple occasions and across administrations—have asked the Supreme Court to consider the propriety of the 'expansive remedy' of nationwide injunctions."
The Liberal Justices' Strong Dissent
The Court's three liberal justices—Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson—issued forceful dissents expressing alarm about the majority's ruling. Justice Sotomayor wrote a particularly scathing dissent of more than 40 pages, arguing that the Court was voluntarily surrendering a crucial power to check executive overreach.
"No right is safe in the new legal regime the Court creates," Sotomayor warned in her dissent. "Today, the threat is to birthright citizenship. Tomorrow, a different administration may try to seize firearms from law-abiding citizens or prevent people of certain faiths from gathering to worship. The majority holds that, absent cumbersome class-action litigation, courts cannot completely enjoin even such plainly unlawful policies unless doing so is necessary to afford the formal parties complete relief. That holding renders constitutional guarantees meaningful in name only for any individuals who are not parties to a lawsuit."
The liberal justices also indicated their view that Trump's birthright citizenship order was "clearly unlawful," though they could not address its constitutionality directly since that was not the question before the Court.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote a separate dissent in addition to joining Sotomayor's opinion, though the specific contents of her individual dissent were not detailed in the available sources.
Practical Implications of the Ruling
The Supreme Court's decision has immediate and far-reaching practical consequences. Most significantly, it means that Trump's executive order on birthright citizenship can now potentially be enforced in the 28 states that are not parties to the ongoing lawsuits challenging the policy. However, the Court indicated that agencies have 30 days to develop and issue public guidance about implementation of the policy.
The ruling fundamentally changes the litigation landscape for challenging presidential policies. Going forward, individual district court judges will be significantly constrained in their ability to issue sweeping nationwide orders blocking federal policies. This could make it much more difficult for advocacy groups and state attorneys general to halt controversial presidential directives, as they would need to either bring class-action lawsuits or coordinate litigation across multiple jurisdictions to achieve similar nationwide relief.
The decision also affects the Trump administration's battles in other policy areas. The administration is currently defending itself in more than 400 legal challenges to Trump's wide-ranging efforts to reshape the federal government, implement aggressive deportation policies, end diversity initiatives, impose tariffs, and pursue various other agenda items. The ruling will make it significantly easier for the administration to implement these policies while litigation proceeds.
The Road Ahead for Birthright Citizenship
While the Supreme Court's June 27 ruling was a procedural, and indeed temporary, victory for Trump, it explicitly did not address the underlying constitutional question of whether the president can eliminate birthright citizenship through executive action. The Apex Court's decision leaves that fundamental issue for future consideration, either through the ongoing lower court cases or through a separate, more comprehensive Supreme Court review.
The individual lawsuits challenging President Trump's citizenship order will continue to proceed through the courts, and it remains possible that the constitutional question could eventually reach the Supreme Court again. However, several conservative justices appeared skeptical during oral arguments about supporting a departure from the established precedent reinforcing birthright citizenship.
Legal experts and constitutional scholars remain nearly unanimous that Trump cannot eliminate birthright citizenship through executive order alone, as it would require a constitutional amendment to overturn the 14th Amendment's clear language and 127 years of Supreme Court precedent. The American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights organizations have vowed to continue fighting the order, calling it "a reckless and ruthless repudiation of American values."
Public Opinion and Political Context
The birthright citizenship controversy reflects broader tensions in American politics over immigration policy and constitutional interpretation. A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in June 2025 found that 24% of respondents supported ending birthright citizenship while 52% opposed it. The issue showed stark partisan divisions, with only 5% of Democrats supporting the change compared to 43% of Republicans.
Trump and his supporters have long argued that birthright citizenship creates incentives for illegal immigration and "birth tourism," where pregnant women enter the United States specifically to give birth so their children can obtain citizenship. They contend that the current system is being abused and that there should be tougher standards for American citizenship.
Opponents argue that birthright citizenship is fundamental to American identity and has been a cornerstone of the nation's immigration system for over a century. They warn that creating a permanent subclass of people born in the United States but denied citizenship would undermine American values and create significant practical and humanitarian problems.
Historical and Constitutional Significance
The Supreme Court's June 27, 2025, decision represents one of the most significant rulings on federal judicial power in recent decades. By restricting nationwide injunctions, the Apex Court has fundamentally altered the balance of power between the federal judiciary and the executive branch, potentially making it easier for future Presidents to implement controversial policies without facing immediate, comprehensive judicial review.
The ruling also highlights ongoing tensions over constitutional interpretation and the role of courts in checking executive authority. While the conservative majority framed their decision as restoring proper judicial restraint and respecting the separation of powers, the liberal dissent viewed it as abdication of the judiciary's crucial role in protecting constitutional rights.
The birthright citizenship controversy itself touches on some of the most fundamental questions in American constitutional law: Who is an American citizen? How should the Constitution be interpreted? What is the proper balance between executive authority and judicial review? These questions have resonated throughout American history, from the Dred Scott decision through the 14th Amendment's ratification to the Wong Kim Ark precedent and now to Trump's contemporary challenge.
As the legal battles continue in lower courts and the Trump Administration begins implementing its citizenship restrictions in states not covered by the remaining injunctions, the nation will be watching to see how this constitutional drama unfolds. The Supreme Court's procedural ruling may have given President Trump a significant tactical victory, but the deeper questions about birthright citizenship, executive power, and judicial authority remain far from resolved.
The June 27 decision will likely be remembered as a pivotal moment in the ongoing struggle to define the proper roles of America's three branches of government and the scope of constitutional protections for fundamental rights like citizenship. Its implications will extend far beyond the specific question of birthright citizenship to influence how future constitutional challenges are litigated and resolved.