What can't go on, won't
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Biden Judge Invokes the Mythical Irrational and Imprudent Clause to Block Trump
Duane Patterson:
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. [Okay, I had to look that one up: “… Under which sovereignty is taken away from the people and handed over to judges to decide who rules the citizenry.”] The country will not be able to withstand whim of law by partisan district court judges for very long.
….
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 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.
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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.
In the not-so-very-long run, this may all turn out to our benefit, because the Supreme Court is going to be forced to step in. Federal judges, unelected and appointed for life, are issuing nationwide injunctions constraining the actions of the administrative branch. In times past, these temporary injunctions were ordered on a case-specific basis, and their scope was almost always limited to the particular judicial district a judge was sitting in. No longer, and that’s a problem.
Patterson continues, with a list of just some of the nationwide injunctions issued by pro-Democrat judges in the past month:
Deborah L. Boardman
Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland
Action: Issued a nationwide preliminary injunction on February 5, 2025, blocking Trump’s executive order to end birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants.
Details: Ruled in a lawsuit by civil rights groups and pregnant immigrants, citing the 14th Amendment and Supreme Court precedent (Wong Kim Ark, 1898).
John C. Coughenour
Court: U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington (Seattle)
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.
Details: Called the order “blatantly unconstitutional,” extending a prior 14-day block into an indefinite injunction pending litigation.
John J. McConnell Jr.
Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island
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.
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.
Amir Ali
Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
Action: Blocked the Trump Administration freeze of all U.S. foreign aid. Has updated ordered ordering the Trump Administration to restore funding immediately.
Details: Ruled after nonprofits and public health groups sued, noting the freeze interfered with congressional appropriations authority.
Paul A. Engelmayer
Court: U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York
Action: Issued a preliminary injunction on February 8, 2025, blocking Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency from accessing Treasury Department records.
Details: Acted on a lawsuit by 19 Democratic attorneys general challenging Trump’s administrative restructuring efforts.
Joseph N. Laplante
Court: U.S. District Court for the District of New Hampshire
Action: Issued a preliminary injunction on February 10, 2025, blocking the birthright citizenship executive order.
Details: Third judge to block this policy, promising a detailed ruling later, in a case tied to immigrant rights groups.
Kelley B. Hodge
Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts
Action: Issued an injunction on February 10, 2025, blocking cuts to health research grants.
Details: Responded to a lawsuit by 22 Democratic attorneys general against Trump’s funding reduction plans.
Carl J. Nichols
Court: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia
Action: Issued a temporary restraining order on February 7, 2025, pausing a USAID downsizing deadline.
Details: Blocked a midnight deadline that would have placed 2,200 USAID employees on administrative leave, part of Trump’s federal workforce reduction efforts.
Patterson:
With exceptions to the injunctions on birthright citizenship, which is a legitimate Constitutional matter that the Supreme Court will ultimately have to decide once and for all, every other judge in question here is substituting their own partisan position that the administrative state needs to be protected from the clutches of the President, who was elected to reduce and end the reign of terror by the very same administrative state. What is happening in the district courts are an extra-curricular Constitutional exercise, and it's not the first time we've seen shadow governance by judicial fiat from a friendly judge. But the sheer volume of judges fighting back at the Trump administration has to be giving the conservative majority on the Court a sense that they're going to have to throw the flag soon.