Over the course of his presidency and beyond, Donald Trump has tested the limits of federal power through executive orders, agency maneuvers, and constitutional brinkmanship. In the district and appellate courts, the legal response has been swift and withering: Trump’s administration has lost over 90 percent of its cases at the trial level, an astonishing rate for a presidency so intent on legal disruption. But the story takes a dramatic turn at the top. Despite an overall win rate of only 47 percent on the Supreme Court’s full docket—the worst of any modern president—Trump has recently enjoyed a string of victories from the emergency docket, where the Court has supported him in nine of eleven cases in 2025 alone.
The most recent and consequential of these victories came in Trump v. CASA, where the Court stripped federal district courts of their authority to issue nationwide injunctions unless those injunctions are tailored to provide “complete relief” solely to the parties before them. This ruling, couched in the language of judicial restraint, is in fact a tectonic realignment of power within the federal judiciary, taken from the district courts and usurped by the Supreme Court. And it is a mistake of profound consequences––comparable to Dred Scott v. Sandford, Citizens United v. FEC, and Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
The Evolution of Equitable Relief
It may seem surprising that the Supreme Court had never squarely held—until now—that federal district courts under the Judiciary Act of 1789 lack equitable authority to issue universal (nationwide) injunctions. In fact, prior to Trump v. CASA, the Court had assumed or implicitly accepted that such authority existed in appropriate circumstances. The Judiciary Act of 1789 authorized federal courts to issue equitable relief “according to the usages and principles of equity.” That meant courts could issue injunctions and other remedies modeled on English chancery practice. However, the Act itself does not define the geographic scope of those injunctions—only the nature of the relief (i.e., equitable versus legal). So, the statute granted equitable power, but it did not explicitly limit or authorize injunctions that bound the government beyond the named parties to a suit.
Equitable relief in American history, however, has always evolved, and structural injunctions (e.g., desegregation, prison reform) often affected nonparties. Federal courts have long used broad relief as a practical necessity in constitutional litigation. Justice Sotomayor’s dissent in Trump v. CASA echoes this view: “The majority ignores that equity has never been static; it responds to the nature of the wrong and the shape of the remedy needed.”
Nationwide Injunctions: A Vital Tool for Protecting Fundamental Rights
When federal policies threaten fundamental constitutional protections—be it birthright citizenship, reproductive autonomy, due process for asylum seekers, or equal treatment under the law—a geographically confined remedy is not a remedy at all. Rights guaranteed under the Constitution are not contingent upon zip codes. If a federal policy violates the rights of one individual in Illinois, it is no less violative when applied to a family in California or a student in Florida. Yet under the logic of Trump v. CASA, a district court may now recognize the unconstitutionality of such a policy and still be powerless to stop it for anyone beyond the parties before it. This is not justice: it is a legal architecture at the service of the executive power.
The Court’s majority insists that this decision is a return to judicial modesty. But this is no modest retrenchment. It is a fundamental redefinition of the role of trial courts in our constitutional system. Where district courts were once the first and often only accessible shield for marginalized communities facing nationwide harm, they are now relegated to issuing narrow, party-specific relief, regardless of the systemic scope of the injury.
A Disregard for the Practical Realities of Power
The Court’s reliance on 18th-century equity jurisprudence—suggesting that nationwide injunctions lack historical pedigree—is not only historically debatable, but also intellectually dishonest. The federal government of 2025 is not the British Crown of 1789. Executive agencies today wield national, often instantaneous, authority. When ICE implements an unlawful deportation rule or the Department of Health and Human Services rewrites regulations affecting millions, the injury is not local or isolated—it is structural and universal.
And the remedy must match the injury.
Limiting injunctions to named plaintiffs invites a parade of absurdities: hundreds of identical lawsuits in dozens of jurisdictions, conflicting rulings, chaotic enforcement, and a government that may pick and choose where and how to comply with the law. The very uniformity the Constitution demands from federal power is now denied to its legal challengers.
Undermining the Judiciary’s Constitutional Role
At a moment when democratic norms are under siege and executive overreach is increasingly normalized, the Supreme Court’s decision in Trump v. CASA strikes a blow not only at vulnerable plaintiffs but at the institutional credibility of the lower courts themselves. The opinion subtly reconfigures judicial power—away from courts that hear evidence, develop factual records, and apply the law to lived reality—and toward a Supreme Court increasingly comfortable acting as the unelected, but ultimate gatekeeper of national policy secluded in an ivory tower.
This shift is not abstract. It undermines the separation of powers by transforming district courts into mere procedural technicians, stripping them of their ability to act as robust constitutional arbiters in the face of executive excess.
What the Court Could Have Done Instead
The solution is not to eliminate nationwide injunctions. The solution is to regulate their use responsibly. Courts could adopt a principled test, allowing nationwide relief when:
- The challenged policy is facially unlawful or constitutionally defective.
- The harm extends beyond the plaintiffs in a way that individual relief cannot repair.
- Uniformity is essential to prevent confusion or arbitrary enforcement.
Such a test would respect both judicial restraint and constitutional integrity. But the Court chose blunt prohibition over nuanced discretion. It answered a scalpel-worthy question with a chainsaw.
Conclusion: The Geography of Rights in the Age of Trump
Donald Trump’s record before the courts has always reflected a double image: resounding rejection at the trial level, ideological rescue at the Supreme Court. But Trump v. CASA marks more than a personal vindication. It codifies a judicial worldview in which rights are geographically fractured, remedies are procedurally limited, and the executive is permitted to act, nationally and swiftly, without equivalent judicial oversight––another step in the coronation of our modern king, which can benefit not only Trump but future presidents.
We are now left with a judiciary that can recognize a constitutional wrong but decline to stop it—because to do so universally would be too bold, too expansive, too unhistorical. But what, then, is the point of having courts at all?
Justice must reach as far as injustice dares to travel. In that, geography must not be destiny. And constitutional protection must not depend on the filing address of the plaintiff.
Amaury Cruz is a writer, political activist, and retired lawyer living in South Carolina. He holds a bachelor’s in political science and a Juris Doctor.