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news analysis
Courts are serving as a rare check on President Trump, but judicial orders to unwind his actions can be easier said than done.
Charlie Savage writes about presidential power and legal policy.
May 23, 2025, 12:52 p.m. ET
President Trump has suffered a string of court losses in recent days, as federal judges ruled that his administration broke the law on a number of matters, including firing officials, shutting down organizations and deporting migrants.
But if the decisions all point in the same direction — Mr. Trump and his team have acted lawlessly in egregious ways, judges emphatically said — the real-world consequences may vary.
That is because even assuming all those rulings were to be upheld on appeal, some of Mr. Trump’s actions would be easier to undo than others. And the slow pace of litigation means the judiciary is often many steps behind and in some cases, unable to catch up.
Still, courts serve as a rare check on Mr. Trump, who has steamrolled constraints inside the executive branch, enjoys broad immunity for his official acts because of a 2024 Supreme Court ruling and, as a matter of political reality, has little reason to fear impeachment or even serious oversight inquiries by the Republican-controlled Congress.
The Trump administration has responded, as it often does to court losses, by lobbing insults — calling one such ruling a “rogue judge’s attempt to impede on the separation of powers” and another the act of “an unelected judge with a political ax to grind.” In an interview with the New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, Vice President JD Vance declared, “I know this is inflammatory, but I think you are seeing an effort by the courts to quite literally overturn the will of the American people.”
The denunciations make clear that appeals are inevitable, so the story is not yet over.
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