President Donald Trump listens to White House adviser David Sacks as he signs an executive order regarding cryptocurrency in the Oval Office, Jan. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, File)
Almost all these requests for emergency relief have been rejected in court, with judges noting that plaintiffs lacked standing, and ordering both parties to return for a later hearing date to consider the merits of the case.
Some Trump allies and legal commentators have criticized the many lawsuits as a way for plaintiffs to skip over the traditional administrative appeals process and take their case directly to the courts instead – a pattern they say has prompted the wave of rejections by federal judges.
There is an internal review process for agency-specific actions or directives, which can be challenged via appeals to administrative law judges or an agency-specific court.
But doing so for executive orders or presidential actions is much more difficult.
According to information from the Code of Federal Regulations and the Federal Register, a president’s executive order can be revoked or modified only by the president or via the legislative branch, if the president was acting on authority that had been granted by Congress.
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President Donald Trump speaks as Elon Musk, joined by his son X Æ A-Xii, listens in the Oval Office, Feb. 11, 2025. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
These near-term court victories have buoyed Trump allies and the Department of Government Efficiency, allowing DOGE, at least for now, to continue carrying out their ambitious early-days agenda and claiming "victory."
"LFG," Elon Musk cheered on X recently, in response to a court's rejection of a request from labor unions seeking to block DOGE access to federal agency information.
Other accounts have praised the overwhelming court rejections of emergency restraining orders as evidence that the Trump administration, and DOGE, are "winning" – a characterization that legal experts warn is largely premature.
In fact, they've noted, the slow-moving legal challenges and nature of the court calendar are features, not bugs.
This includes efforts to block or curtail DOGE from accessing internal government information or firing agency employees; lawsuits aimed at blocking the Trump administration's transgender military ban; and complaints seeking to block the release or public identification of FBI personnel involved in Jan. 6 investigations, among many other things.
But that's not because every one of these actions is legitimate. Rather, legal experts say, the near-term "victories" hinge on the limited power a judge has to intervene in proving emergency relief, or granting temporary restraining orders.
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President Donald Trump speaks before Pam Bondi is sworn in as attorney general in the Oval Office on Feb. 5, 2025. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
One exception is the Trump administration's ban on birthright citizenship.
The request for immediate relief, was granted by multiple U.S. district courts judges, who sided with plaintiffs in ruling that hundreds of children born in the U.S. were at risk of real harm.
It was also upheld by a U.S. appeals court last week, setting the stage for a possible Supreme Court fight.
But barring that, most of the lawsuits will play out in the longer-term, Goldberg, wrote in the Lawfare op-ed.
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"Stepping back, the current litigation landscape of TROs and preliminary injunctions may seem quite extraordinary… But considered in context, these many provisional orders suggest that even more extraordinary are the government’s threatened actions, both in their likely unlawfulness and their potential for irreparable harm," she said.
Breanne Deppisch is a politics reporter for Fox News Digital covering the Trump administration, with a focus on the Justice Department, FBI, and other national news.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/heres-why-dozens-lawsuits-seeking-quash-trumps-early-actions-president-failing