At some point, the Supreme Court is going to get pretty tired of this nonsense. Until then, we are living under a Constitutional framework that says the President gets to run all of Article II agencies and departments…unless a federal judge determines the actions of that president aren’t cool and slaps down a nationwide injunction to stop it. It’s no longer a functional democratic republic in which we’re residing, but a kritocracy. The country will not be able to withstand whim of law by partisan district court judges for very long.
On June 7th, 2023, Judge Loren Alikhan, a Joe Biden appointee for a U.S. District Court judgeship in the District of Columbia, appeared in her confirmation hearing, and had to run the John Kennedy gauntlet. Kennedy, the Louisiana Republican, has become legendary for his unassuming line of questioning of Biden left-wing judges, but questions that have elicited peculiar responses to say the least. Here is a key exchange of Kennedy with Judge Alikhan.
She doesn’t have a political point of view. Her political opinions will not make up the basis for any of her decisions, she promised. She cleared Senate Judiciary by a 11-10 party-line vote. When her nomination came to the floor of the Senate, then managed by Chuck Schumer and the Democrats, Vice-President Kamala Harris had to come break a 50-50 tie.
Late morning on Tuesday, Judge Loren Alikhan issued an indefinite injunction against the Trump administration, barring the elected leader of the Article II branch from freezing grants and loan payments as part of their effort to cut waste, fraud, and abuse.
Did she find in her ruling that Trump’s actions violated the Due Process Clause in the 5th and 14th Amendments, citing capricious and unfair treatments at the hands of DOGE or agency heads? Why no, no she did not. Did she invoke the Commerce Clause as a backdoor into finding that the President of the United States can’t actually rein in agencies of which he is Constitutionally responsible? Nah.
She invented the Irrational and Imprudent Clause.
“In the simplest terms, the freeze was ill-conceived from the beginning. Defendants either wanted to pause up to $3 trillion in federal spending practically overnight, or they expected each federal agency to review every single one of its grants, loans, and funds for compliance in less than twenty-four hours,” US District Judge Loren AliKhan wrote as she issued a preliminary injunction against the administration. “The breadth of that command is almost unfathomable.”
“Either way, Defendants’ actions were irrational, imprudent, and precipitated a nationwide crisis,” she added.
In other words, she formed a political opinion. She came to the conclusion that she didn’t like what Trump and his team were doing, because politically, she thought it would cause too much chaos and commotion, and in her own definition of prudence and irrationality, used her political views to directly impact her rulings.
In case you’re scrambling through your copy of the Constitution for the Irrational and Imprudent Clause, let me save you a little time and effort. It ain’t there.
A jurist literally only on the bench because of Democratic Party votes is now exercising her unelected power on top of the individual who was elected to run the government.
Her decision will obviously be appealed, which will chew up time and resources. Judge Alikhan joins a list of Democratically-appointed district court judges that have thrown themselves into the breach of the running of the federal government by way of nationwide injunction.
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Deborah L. Boardman
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Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland
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Action: Issued a nationwide preliminary injunction on February 5, 2025, blocking Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants.
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Details: Ruled in a lawsuit by civil rights groups and pregnant immigrants, citing the 14th Amendment and Supreme Court precedent (Wong Kim Ark, 1898).
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John C. Coughenour
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Court: U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington (Seattle)
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Action: Issued a temporary restraining order on January 23, 2025, followed by a nationwide preliminary injunction on February 6, 2025, against the birthright citizenship executive order.
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Details: Called the order “blatantly unconstitutional,” extending a prior 14-day block into an indefinite injunction pending litigation.
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John J. McConnell Jr.
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Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island
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Action: Issued a temporary restraining order on January 31, 2025, and later reinforced it on February 10, 2025, blocking a Trump administration federal funding freeze.
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Details: Responded to a lawsuit by 22 Democratic-led states, ordering the restoration of frozen funding and accusing the administration of violating his initial order.
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Amir Ali
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Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
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Action: Blocked the Trump Administration freeze of all U.S. foreign aid. Has updated ordered ordering the Trump Administration to restore funding immediately.
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Details: Ruled after nonprofits and public health groups sued, noting the freeze interfered with congressional appropriations authority.
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Paul A. Engelmayer
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Court: U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York
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Action: Issued a preliminary injunction on February 8, 2025, blocking Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department records.
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Details: Acted on a lawsuit by 19 Democratic attorneys general challenging Trump’s administrative restructuring efforts.
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Joseph N. Laplante
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Court: U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire
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Action: Issued a preliminary injunction on February 10, 2025, blocking the birthright citizenship executive order.
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Details: Third judge to block this policy, promising a detailed ruling later, in a case tied to immigrant rights groups.
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Kelley B. Hodge
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Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts
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Action: Issued an injunction on February 10, 2025, blocking cuts to health research grants.
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Details: Responded to a lawsuit by 22 Democratic attorneys general against Trump’s funding reduction plans.
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Carl J. Nichols
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Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
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Action: Issued a temporary restraining order on February 7, 2025, pausing a USAID downsizing deadline.
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Details: Blocked a midnight deadline that would have placed 2,200 USAID employees on administrative leave, part of Trump’s federal workforce reduction efforts.
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Thus far, the White House has had a good batting average against the myriad of legal challenges put in their way. The lack of Constitutional rationale behind the injunctions tends to make them temporary blocks rather than permanent ones. But this issue of judge shopping for a friendly jurist to issue nationwide injunctions is a modern-day phenomenon, relatively-speaking, and the Court has to know it’s getting out of hand. It’s time to restore the judiciary to their proper oversight role.
If there’s a challenge to an executive action on Constitutional grounds, so be it. But if judges are just making rulings from the bench because they don’t like it, or that they find it to be ‘imprudent and irrational’, that’s no way to keep a republic.
