The Trump administration lost its lawsuit against a federal court in Maryland after it sued the bench for its automatic injunctions against deportations.
“As events over the past several months have revealed, these are not normal times—at least regarding the interplay between the executive and this coordinate branch of government,” US District Judge Thomas Cullen wrote. “It’s no surprise that the executive chose a different, and more confrontational, path entirely.”
“Much as the Executive fights the characterization, a lawsuit by the executive branch of government against the judicial branch for the exercise of judicial power is not ordinary,” he explained. “The Executive’s lawsuit will be dismissed, and its motion for preliminary injunction denied as moot. Whatever the merits of its grievance with the judges of the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, the Executive must find a proper way to raise those concerns.”
The lawsuit, filed in June, argued that district courts have “used and abused their equitable powers to interfere with the prerogatives of the Executive Branch to an unprecedented degree.” The filing came as the US District Court for the District of Maryland issued an order that required the clerk to automatically enter an injunction preventing the deportation of illegal immigrants who file a petition for writ of habeas corpus.
“Defendants’ lawless standing orders are nothing more than a particularly egregious example of judicial overreach interfering with Executive Branch prerogatives—and thus undermining the democratic process,” the filing added.
“Inconvenience to the Court is not a basis to enter an injunction,” the DOJ wrote in the lawsuit, “and filings outside normal business hours, scheduling difficulties, and the possibility of hurried and frustrating hearings are not irreparable harms.”
