The Supreme Court heard arguments on Thursday, May 15, concerning birthright citizenship and the authority of lower courts to issue nationwide injunctions on executive actions. Justice Elena Kagan offered critical remarks on the Trump administration’s legal stance.
During the over two-hour oral arguments, Justice Kagan pointedly questioned U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer about the administration’s approach, which contests the power of lower courts to block President Donald Trump’s executive order on birthright citizenship through nationwide injunctions.
“If I were in your shoes, there’s no way I’d approach the court with this case!” Kagan remarked during an exchange reflecting the intense nature of the proceedings.
When Sauer began discussing legal remedies for similar situations, Kagan interjected, stressing the real-world implications. “This is not a hypothetical — this is happening out there. Every court is ruling against you,” she noted, referring to the administration’s consistent losses in lower courts regarding the birthright citizenship matter.
The case involves three lower courts that issued national injunctions earlier this year, blocking President Trump’s executive order signed on January 20, 2025. The order seeks to reinterpret the 14th Amendment to deny automatic U.S. citizenship to children born in the U.S. if their mother is unlawfully present or temporarily in the country, and if their father is neither a U.S. citizen nor a lawful permanent resident at the time of birth.
Sauer, representing the administration, argued that nationwide injunctions signify judicial overreach and should only apply to specific plaintiffs who filed lawsuits. He claimed such universal injunctions have “exploded” in use since 2007 and signify a “pathology” within the legal system.
The administration’s stance was met with skepticism from the court’s liberal members. Justice Sonia Sotomayor presented a hypothetical scenario about presidential overreach: “If a new president decided to seize all guns in the country, would we in the courts have to sit back and wait until every plaintiff whose gun is taken comes into court?”
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson described the administration’s argument as creating a “catch me if you can kind of regime,” requiring each affected individual to file their own lawsuit.
Even among the court’s conservatives, questions for Sauer were challenging. Justice Amy Coney Barrett pressed him on the government’s reluctance to address the substantive constitutional question on birthright citizenship and later questioned whether the administration believes it must comply with all federal court decisions.
Sauer admitted the Trump administration does not uniformly adhere to lower court precedents, prompting Barrett to express concern, asking, “Did I understand you correctly to tell Justice Kagan that the government wanted to reserve its right to maybe not follow a … circuit court precedent, say, in New York, because you might disagree with the opinion?”
The case carries significant implications beyond birthright citizenship. A Supreme Court ruling could affect hundreds of federal lawsuits challenging White House actions since Trump began his second term. According to a Fox News analysis, over 310 such lawsuits have been filed since January 20.
While the procedural issue of nationwide injunctions was central to the arguments, the court occasionally touched on the substantive issue of birthright citizenship itself. Sauer argued that the 14th Amendment, which guarantees birthright citizenship, was meant for freed slaves, not immigrants to the United States.
Justice Sotomayor disagreed with this view, noting that Trump’s order could leave thousands of newborns “stateless” – not citizens in the U.S. and potentially not granted citizenship by their parents’ countries of origin. She highlighted that many lower courts found the order violates “not only precedent but the plain meaning of the 14th Amendment.”
New Jersey Solicitor General Jeremy Feigenbaum, representing the states challenging the order, warned of “unprecedented chaos on the ground” if nationwide injunctions were abolished. He urged the justices to consider the impracticality of having birthright citizenship recognized in some states but not others.
Feigenbaum, with prior experience arguing before the Supreme Court, acknowledged concerns about district courts influencing nationwide policy and agreed that nationwide injunctions should be used sparingly, suggesting the Court could help define when such injunctions are appropriate.
Kelsi Corkran, representing individual families and immigrant advocacy groups, opposed Justice Kavanaugh’s suggestion that class-action lawsuits could replace nationwide injunctions. She stated this approach would require vulnerable immigrants to identify themselves to the government, placing them “at great risk of adverse consequences, detention or deportation.”
The stakes are particularly high for immigrant families impacted by the executive order. More than 150,000 newborns would be denied citizenship annually if Trump’s order is implemented, according to plaintiffs contesting the directive.
Outside the Supreme Court building, hundreds of protesters convened to oppose Trump’s birthright citizenship order. Some chanted pro-immigrant slogans while Representative Nancy Pelosi, standing on the court’s steps, read aloud the text of the 14th Amendment to cheers from the crowd.
The justices appeared divided on resolving the complex case. Chief Justice John Roberts noted benefits in allowing appeals courts sufficient time to rule on the merits before cases reach the Supreme Court. Justice Clarence Thomas pointed out that “we survived until the 1960s without universal injunctions,” suggesting the legal system could operate without them.
Justice Kavanaugh, appointed by Trump during his first term, explored a middle ground by examining whether class-action lawsuits could offer the practical benefits of nationwide injunctions while addressing concerns about judicial overreach.
A decision in this high-profile case is anticipated by early summer, potentially reshaping both the immediate issue of birthright citizenship and the broader relationship between the judiciary and executive branch during Trump’s second term.