On Wednesday night, Chief John Roberts temporarily suspended the lower court order.
In this case, it is important not to read too much of Roberts' temporary orders. State Department vs AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition. Judges often have the authority to cast a “pause” in lawsuits, spending more time understanding how the law requires them to act. Roberts issued an order Wednesday to give him more time to consider questions presented to his colleagues. AIDS vaccine case.
However, current disputes before the Supreme Court are important for at least two reasons. First: It's the first Trump-era incident involving a reservoir, a legally questionable claim that the president can cancel federal spending mandated by law enacted by Congress. The 1974 Water Storage Management Act puts very strict limits on the president's ability to re-recommend Congress' spending decisions. Typically, the president must seek permission from Congress before canceling his spending.
But nonetheless, Trump has insisted on his authority to do so without legislative approval.
The second reason is that in the Justice Department recently filed with the Supreme Court, Trump's legal team appears to be making clear how they circumvent rules similar to the Water Storage Control Act.
Importantly, the Trump administration has not argued that the president has the inherent constitutional authority to save money, at least not yet. In fact, DOJ's recent submissions have not even argued that Trump's decision to halt USAID spending is legal. Instead, the Trump administration lacks the power to issue widespread orders that will restore the entire government spending that has been cancelled by the administration, suggesting that these cases must be resolved in fragments instead.
Think of it like this. Suppose the Trump administration is issuing an illegal order to prohibit the government from paying contractors named “Susan.” Now, let's assume that the 10,000 Susans, who are being paid by the federal government, are seeking a single court order declaring this anti-Susan policy illegal. The Trump administration's legal argument suggests that such court orders are not permitted, and each Susan may need to bring its own legal proceedings to get paid.
Needless to say, this tactic could significantly hinder efforts to make the Trump administration comply with federal spending laws. If the Supreme Court accepts administration debate, Trump and his men are free to issue blanket orders cancelling the entire category of federal spending. On the other hand, anyone affected by these cancellations may need to maintain their own attorneys, decide which court or federal agency will have jurisdiction over their claims, and file a lawsuit that takes months or years to resolve. Many of these potential litigators may simply give up. Others were able to go out of business while the government waited for them to pay what it owed.
The president is not allowed to save money allocated by Congress.
The question of whether the president may simply refuse to spend the money that Congress ordered to spend on the administrative department is very easy to solve. Future Supreme Court Justice William Lanequist wrote in a 1969 Department of Justice memo:
There is nothing in the constitution to support the claim that the president may impose funds. And there are several constitutional provisions that oppose this claim, including what the President says is “respectfully enforced by the law.” That provision places an obligation on the President to faithfully implement laws requiring federal spending.
Additionally, at least two members of the current Republican majority of the Supreme Court have previously shown that they agree to Lanequist's 1969 memo. As a White House lawyer in 1985, Roberts wrote that it was “clear” that the president cannot fill funds in “normal circumstances” (though the ominous signs of the USAID suggest that presidential authority may be large if he is involved in diplomacy). Roberts added: “There is clearly no region than the power of the wallet or the states of Congress.”
Similarly, in a 2013 opinion, Judge Brett Kavanaugh wrote about the funds allocated by Congress when he was still a judge in the lower court, “even the president has no one-sided authority to refuse spending.”
Despite this, Trump has signed a Cleaning Bureau that is trying to stop federal spending. These include a January 20th order aimed at imposing a “90-day suspension of US foreign development support for assessment of program efficiency and consistency with US foreign policy,” and a domestic spending order that appears wide enough to freeze Medicaid (though the White House caused a two-way backlash after somewhat retarding its policies).
AIDS vaccine The lawsuit offers this Supreme Court the first opportunity to consider Trump's efforts to halt federal spending. The narrow debate from the Justice Department suggests that at least Trump's lawyers prefer to delay a broader showdown over whether Trump can simply cancel the funds he wants.
So what is the specific question before the court? AIDS vaccine?
The particular dispute before justice arises now from a pair of orders issued by Federal District Judge Amir Ali. The first showed that the comprehensive suspension of Trump's USAID funds was illegally arbitrary, as the administration “has not provided any explanation” as to why a comprehensive suspension of all foreign aid allocated to all Congress is a reasonable precursor to review the program.
Therefore, Ali temporarily banned “preventing obligations or payments of suspension, suspension or other obligations” as approved as of January 19th.
The second order was to implement the first order by requiring the State Department and USAID to pay all invoices and credit drawdown requests for all contracts completed prior to court admission. [first order] February 13th. ”
Meanwhile, most of the Trump administration's outline argues that Justice Ali lacks jurisdiction over the case, and Ali's orders are also broad. AIDS vaccine case. Again, in Ali's second order, the Department of State requires that “pay all invoices” for work completed before a certain date. AIDS vaccine plaintiff.
At least some of these claims are plausible. The Justice Department has long won “national injunctions” under both the Biden and Trump administrations. This is a lower court order that suspends federal policy nationwide, rather than issuing narrower, more coordinated relief by individual plaintiffs. Some members of the court, especially Justice Neil Gorsuch, are passionate advocates of the view that broad national relief must be reduced. (I also argued that Gorsuch's stance on the national injunction had significant benefits.)
But the Supreme Court decision that prevents judges from issuing widespread injunctions would give the Trump administration a considerable amount of room to act illegally. Again, the administration is free to issue a wide range of new policies that cancel funds that affect millions of Americans. Afterwards, even if the court later determines that the new policy is illegal, individuals and businesses borrowing money must file their own lawsuits requesting repayment.
Some of this imbalance can be resolved through class actions through litigation that allows multiple parties with similar legal claims to participate in the same process. However, there are also restrictions on who can file such class actions, and it is unclear whether multiple parties seeking to enforce multiple contracts on different terms can demonstrate that their cases are sufficiently similar to advance the class action.
All of this is a long way from where the court is unlikely to completely restrict a president who is determined to cancel federal spending, even if he does so illegally. Executives are far more agile than justice, and this is doubly true when the Supreme Court limits the ability of lower courts to block Trump administration policies nationwide.
