US Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Saturday that increasingly frequent lower court rulings blocking controversial Trump administration policies are “unconstitutional.”
“The increasing frequency of limitless injunctions is simply unsustainable, and the ever-more extreme nature of some of these injunctions is only making it more obvious just how unconstitutional they are,” Sessions said, speaking to the Federalist Society.
He later added: “But we are hopeful that the Supreme Court will soon send a clear message to the lower courts that injunctions ought to be limited to the parties in the case.”
The injunctions Sessions was referring to include rulings that have blocked various controversial Trump policies, like the travel ban and future of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals or DACA.
His remarks echo similar comments he made last month at an annual gathering of state attorneys general in Washington. There, he called the growing number of injunctions as a “serious matter of coequal branches.”
In Saturday’s speech, Sessions specifically noted the recent Trump administration win in a Maryland court, where a judge rejected a challenge to the termination of DACA. However, previous judges ruled the opposite, which has temporarily halted the President’s attempt to end the program.
Sessions added that he thought courts “should put an end to nationwide injunctions,” criticizing activists for “paralyzing the federal government.
“There can be no question that courts should put an end to nationwide injunctions and keep activists on both sides of the aisle from paralyzing the functioning of our government,” Sessions said.
“In order for our system to function, the Court must end government-by-litigation. I am hopeful they soon will, and that … with your help we will restore the rule of law in this country.”