Updated June 27, 2025 at 4:59 PM EDT
The Supreme Court in a 6-3 decision along ideological lines on Friday sided with the Trump administration's request to limit universal injunctions issued by federal courts. The opinion in the birthright citizenship case was highly anticipated.
At issue was how the lower courts should handle President Trump's executive order, which declared that the children of parents who enter the U.S. illegally or on a temporary visa are not entitled to automatic citizenship.
The majority opinion, written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, didn't rule on whether Trump's executive order violates the 14th Amendment or the Nationality Act. Instead, it focused on whether federal courts have the power to issue nationwide blocks.
"Universal injunctions likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has given to federal courts," the conservative majority said. "The Court grants the Government's applications for a partial stay of the injunctions entered below, but only to the extent that the injunctions are broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff with standing to sue."
Friday's opinion asked the lower courts to reconsider their broad rulings in light of the Supreme Court's opinion and otherwise "with principles of equity." However, the opinion also said Trump's birthright citizenship order can't take effect for 30 days from Friday's opinion, giving more time for legal challenges.
Trump made a rare appearance in the White House briefing room after the decision, calling it a "monumental victory for the Constitution, the separation of powers and the rule of law." He said the ruling would allow his administration to move forward with key elements of his immigration policy without the threat of broad injunctions against them.
Attorney General Pam Bondi, who joined Trump at the press conference, said that the ruling means "Americans are finally getting what they voted for." She noted that the merits of the birthright citizenship order haven't been litigated yet and declined to answer questions about how it would be implemented and enforced.
More Supreme Court decisions today:
- SCOTUS: Parents can opt kids out of classes with LGBTQ book characters
- Supreme Court upholds key Obamacare measure on preventive care
- Supreme Court sides with Texas' age verification law for porn sites
- Supreme Court postpones Louisiana redistricting case to next term
- Supreme Court upholds program providing internet access to rural Americans
Dissenting from Friday's decision were the court's three liberal justices. Writing for the three of them, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said the government's rush to limit nationwide injunctions "disregards basic principles of equity as well as the long history of injunctive relief granted to nonparties."
Immigrant rights groups and 22 states had sued over Trump's birthright citizenship order, and three different federal district court judges invalidated Trump's order, issuing what are called universal injunctions barring the administration from enforcing the Trump policy anywhere in the United States.
When the courts of appeal refused to intervene while the litigation proceeded, the Trump administration asked the Supreme Court to block universal injunctions altogether.
While Friday's decision is procedural, the issue at the center of the case is Trump's long-held but fringe view that there is no such thing as automatic citizenship for people born in the United States. On his first day in office this year, he signed an executive order declaring that babies born in the U.S. may not be citizens if their parents were not here legally or if the parents were here legally but on a temporary basis, like with a work visa. Trump's view, however, is directly contradicted by a Supreme Court ruling 127 years ago — a decision that has never been disturbed and is based on the text of 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The amendment says: "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States." It was enacted in 1866 after the Civil War and was aimed at reversing the Supreme Court's infamous Dred Scott decision, which had declared that Black people, enslaved or free, could not be citizens. It has always been applied to anyone born in the U.S., and the Supreme Court on Friday did nothing to change that 150-year understanding.
Trump responded to the decision on Truth Social, calling it a "GIANT WIN." He implied that immigrants were trying to scam the process to get U.S. citizenship and that the 14th Amendment was meant to give citizenship only to "babies of slaves (same year!)."
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