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Supreme Court Rules in Birthright Citizenship Appeal; Supreme Court Limits Court's Ability to Issue Nationwide Injunctions; Supreme Court Leaves Path for Trump to Ban Birthright Citizenship. Aired 10- 10:30a ET

Aired June 27, 2025 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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[10:00:00]

PAMELA BROWN, CNN ANCHOR: Happening now, breaking news, blockbuster decision day. At any moment, the Supreme Court will rule on several key cases. One still left to be decided, birthright citizenship, and the national authority of lower courts.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: Plus, crucial classified intel briefing. Right now, House lawmakers are getting very classified sensitive information from U.S. intelligence officials on the U.S. airstrikes on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer with Pamela Brown, and you're in The Situation Room.

At any moment, the U.S. Supreme Court will begin handing down the final decisions of its term. This will be a very big hour of opinions. No ruling is more anticipated than the challenge to President Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship here in the United States.

The court will decide whether the president can enforce the ban on birthright citizenship after lower courts blocked it across the nation, indeed. This case could shift the balance of power between courts and the executive branch.

BROWN: And there's another key case right out of Maryland. Some parents, the Montgomery County School System just outside of D.C. where we are now, cite religious objections to the reading of LGBTQ- plus books in elementary school. Those parents want an opt-out policy so that they can pull their children from those lessons.

BLITZER: CNN's Chief Legal Affairs Correspondent Paula Reid is just outside the Supreme Court here in Washington. Paula, what are you expecting this morning?

PAULA REID, CNN CHIEF LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Well, already the unexpected has happened. I'm going to break away from this live shot because we understand that we have gotten the biggest case of the term first of these six opinions we're getting today. This is the case related to birthright citizenship that may also answer questions about judicial power, so-called nationwide injunctions. This is the idea that a single judge anywhere in the country can block a policy for the whole country. Every modern president has been plagued up by these nationwide injunctions, but none more so than President Trump because he does so much through executive action. His lawyers tell me this is the ball game for his executive action.

So, I'm going to break away from this live shot, find out what the justices said. We're just getting this opinion now and be right back with you which will likely be the biggest news out of the term this year.

BLITZER: Yes, major, major development indeed. All right, go ahead. We'll be anticipating your report as soon as you come back. Thanks very much. Pamela?

BROWN: We have the opinion pulled up right here on Elie's laptop. Elie?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: What we're reading furiously, it just came in moments ago. It's 119 pages. But what this decision will do is it will redefine the power relationship between the presidency on the one hand and the district courts on the other.

So, the issue here has been going on for 20-some years, really going back to the George W. Bush administration, where the president issues an executive order and then a single district court judge, a federal trial level judge, issues a nationwide injunction. So, it could be a judge sitting in the western district of Texas, the northern district of California says, I block the president's action for the whole country.

Now, it happened to Barack Obama. It happened to Joe Biden many times, but it has happened to Donald Trump, multiple of that. And now, finally, this case has made its way up to the Supreme Court, and so we're going to go through this case as quickly as we can.

It looks like at first glimpse, and we're just starting, it looks like the court has put some limits on the ability of district courts, trial courts to issue those kind of rulings. And it looks like the court has said district courts only have the power to do that in certain, very narrow circumstances. So, we're going to go through this and get the details soon, but that's the gist.

BROWN: Yes. We want to be careful because there's a lot in there. And we don't even know yet without reading through what it ruled in terms of the constitutionality of birthright citizenship. It was unexpected that they would maybe get to that, but we'll see.

BLITZER: And it's interesting, Deborah, because you're an expert on the Constitution. I've got a copy of the Constitution right here. Article Amendment 14, ratify July 9th, 1868, begins with these words. This is about birthright citizenship. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. That a big issue right now because the president of the United States wanted to eliminate certain kids who were born in the United States for getting birthright citizenship.

[10:05:05]

DEBORAH PEARLSTEIN, FORMER LAW CLERK FOR JUSTICE JOHN PAUL STEVENS: Absolutely. But it's critical to note in this decision in front of the court today, they're not actually deciding on the merits, or we think they're not deciding on the merits of this question, right? The Constitution by its text seems very clear, everybody who's born here is a citizen. The administration is trying to challenge that.

But this initial question before the court today is really just whether a lower court has the power to stop that. All of the lower courts that have heard this question have said they can't deprive people of birthright citizenship. It's unconstitutional. Every lower court to get it so far has said that, and they've enjoined the effect of the president's policy. This question is really only about the power of the courts to stop it before until the Supreme Court has the time to decide the question on the merits.

BLITZER: Good point.

BROWN: And this could really have a lasting impact on the executive branch, David Chalian.

DAVID CHALIAN, CNN WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF: Well, I think, you know, if you recall, when the executive order was issued at the beginning of the term, it was instantly identifiable. And our reporting backed this up as an immediate challenge by the Trump administration to get this to the court. They understood that they were not going to be able to just with the stroke of his pen and nobody respond, eradicate, as you were reading from the Constitution, Wolf, birthright citizenship.

So, part of even putting the executive order out first thing in this term, it was to excite the base that he was delivering on a promise that he had made throughout the entire campaign trail and to get this in the hands of the Supreme Court as fast as possible.

HONIG: So, quickly, on this ruling, this was written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett. She's the author of the opinion. It does look like another one of these 6-3 splits that we've gotten used to with the six conservatives, that's the chief justice, that's Amy Coney Barrett, Thomas Alito, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh on the one side of wanting to limit the power of district courts, and then a dissent by the three liberals. And we've seen this quite a bit by Justices Kagan, Jackson, and Sotomayor. So, you know, we've seen the 6-3 split on a lot of the biggest cases out of the Supreme Court over the last couple years, and it seems that they've had the same split here ideologically.

BROWN: So, then what does that mean? I know you're still reading through this, but, you know, what does that mean for the birthright citizenship executive order from Trump?

HONIG: So, it looks like, as the professor was saying, the court has not decided the birthright citizenship issue, as expected. They have not said Donald Trump is right or wrong in his effort to limit birthright citizenship. That is going to be decided another day, probably next year, you know, it'll come back up to the Supreme Court. But on the issue of whether district court judges can issue nationwide injunctions, can stop the president's action nationwide, conservatives have long been skeptical of that power by district court judges.

Generally speaking, conservatives are more proponents of executive power of the president's power, and, generally speaking, liberals have been bigger believers in the power of an individual district court judge. So, what this appears to do, and I know Paula and Joan and others are going through this, and we're reading as fast as we can, but it does appear to be an expansion of the president's power to issue these orders because it limits the ability of district court judges to stop them.

BROWN: So, where would the check and balance be under this opinion and what the justices are ruling? Where would the check and balance be for a president who creates an executive order that is unconstitutional?

HONIG: Yes. So, the key test appears to be that courts can issue these injunctions, but I'm reading from the brief there now. They cannot be broader than necessary to provide complete relief to each plaintiff withstanding to sue.

Now, that's a little bit of legalese, but, basically, it says if district courts are going to issue these injunctions, they have to be as narrow as possible. They have to give the plaintiffs, the people who've sued what they're asking for, but they shouldn't necessarily impact other people who are not parties to the case unnecessarily.

Now, that's a little bit vague, a little bit broad, but the Supreme Court does that sometimes. They will give a test or a standard and say, okay, from now on, you have to apply this test. It can't be broader than necessary. And then it's up to the courts to duke it out case-by-case.

So, they don't give us mathematical formulas or scientific equations. It's frustrating sometimes but the courts have given us a broad pronouncement, basically limiting to some extent, to what extent will work out in the details, but limiting to some extent the ability of district courts to issue these orders.

The former district court judge, Shira Scheindlin is with us as well. How are you seeing all this unfold, Judge?

SHIRA SCHEINDLIN, FORMER U.S. DISTRICT COURT JUDGE: Well, I wish I'd had the chance to read this entire 119 page opinion. I have not. So, from listening to this summary that I just heard from Elie and others on your panel, it seems to me that the district court powers are limited. I'm not surprised by that. I expected that. There's always been a question about one judge, a single judge being able to enjoin something for the entire country when those people are not before the court, and the court has to limit itself to those who come before them. [10:10:04]

And, you know, it all depends on whose ox is being gored. When national injunctions came out of Texas and stopped Joe Biden's efforts, then the liberals didn't like it. Now, that the national injunctions are stopping President Trump, so the conservatives don't like it.

So, the idea that one single judge can do this has always been a problem. It leads to judge shopping, it leads to going to certain district court judges, and that's never been a good thing.

But, as Elie said, how this will play out in the lower courts is yet to be seen. That will take a long time to develop. What are the circumstances when a judge can do it and when a judge can't do it? So, I think there's going to be a period of confusion in working things out that we can't even begin to predict.

BROWN: All right. I'm going to go to Paula Reid. She's been reading through the opinion. Paula, what are you gleaning from it?

REID: All right, Pamela, here's what we know. This is a big win for President Trump because he has been railing against these so-called nationwide injunctions. This is the power of a single judge to block an executive order for the entire country. And this case came up as a result of multiple challenges to his effort to limit birthright citizenship through an executive order.

Now, here, it appears that the justices are agreeing with Trump and limiting this power that judges have to block a policy for the entire country.

Now on another issue, it does not appear that they have weighed in on whether Trump's effort to limit birthright citizenship is or is not constitutional. Instead, they are limiting the power of these judges to block policies for the entire country, which will likely allow Trump to proceed with this effort to limit birthright citizenship while the larger constitutional questions about whether he can do that are being litigated.

Now, just to explain to you the significance of this, one of President Trump's lawyers told me this case, this is the ball game for President Trump's agenda, because we know more than any modern president, he loves to govern through executive action, and the majority of these have been blocked by lower court judges. So, he has not been able to follow through with things he wanted to do on the budget, on mass firings, on immigration.

So, now that the justices are limiting the power that judges have to block those policies, this is going to allow them to implement these policies more quickly. Though it is possible that some of these might come before the justices and in two or three years with constitutional concerns.

But right now the question was really whether a single judge anywhere in the country could block an executive action for the entire nation. And here, in a historic opinion, the justices are limiting that power. And, again, President Trump's lawyers have told me this is the case that they are watching. This means everything for the president's ability to govern through executive actions.

Now, I'll say these nationwide injunctions, this is a bipartisan concern. These have plagued every modern president, but because President Trump does so much through executive action, he has faced the greatest number of these nationwide injunctions. So, he and his Republican allies here on Capitol Hill, they have been railing against these. This is a pet issue for them. And now the conservative supermajority siding with President Trump and his Republican allies to limit this power from judges, a huge decision.

BLITZER: So, just to be precise, Paula, this was a 6-3 decision, six conservative justices, three liberal justices, is that right?

REID: And it was authored by Justice Amy Coney Barrett. Now, some of her conservative colleagues did also opined concurrences here. We're still reading through those. We have old school, the paper copy, it is very long. We're still getting through the whole opinion. So, these are just the top lines, but this is enormous. This is yet another huge win for President Trump from this conservative super majority.

Now, we have been reporting since Trump took office in January that his lawyers were telling me, even though a lot of their policies were getting bogged down in the lower courts, that anything they could get in front of this high court that they would ultimately win. And they were playing a long game. And this decision right here, this is proof that this long game they've been playing for the past six or seven months, they've won and they've won big time.

BLITZER: All right, Paula, if standby, we'll get back to you as you continue reading this opinion and we'll see what the final decision is with a lot more specific details.

I want to go to Jeff Zeleny. He's over at the White House for us where they're watching very, very closely, probably more closely than any place else in the country right now what the U.S. Supreme Court is doing.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: There's no question about that, Wolf, and exactly what Paula was saying there. This is about something much broader than birthright citizenship. Yes, that specific issue was the venue to get this to the Supreme Court that will likely be decided on a different day. But it is just the idea of this power of the executive branch that really is an issue here.

[10:15:05]

It's hard to think of another administration, and I've covered the last four or five presidents, I guess, that has used their executive authority as much, and it's been challenged by lower courts. Now, the Supreme Court is weighing in and it is giving the executive branch considerable power. One White House official, and they're reading through this opinion in the White House Counsel's Office, just as everyone else's, but is pointing to this line in Justice Amy Coney Barrett's opinion. It says this, when a court concludes that the executive branch has acted unlawfully, the answer is not for the court to exceed its power too. So, basically, if the executive branch has exceeded its authority, a judge cannot also weigh in, a singular judge.

So, the White House is viewing this ruling as very consequential that could affect a variety of policies, a variety of cases that exist really across the spectrum of what this administration has tried to do. So, there's no doubt, even though birthright citizenship was something the president long talked about, he campaigned on, this is bigger than that in a sense, because it is broader and it's that it's answering a question, at least for the moment, about the power of the executive branch that many lower courts have raised into question.

BLITZER: Jeff Zeleny at the White House.

BROWN: Yes. And, obviously, this impacts the power of the executive branch, but it impacts every single American as well. And I think that's a big focus here because I remember, Elie, during the oral arguments. One of the concerns brought up was if judges can't do the nationwide injunction, then you have a patchwork where the plaintiffs, you know, are under the injunction, but others in America wouldn't be under that. And so that's really the question here. How does it address that issue?

HONIG: Yes. And in this case, in the birthright citizenship case, there was something like six different lawsuits filed in six different district Courts. This case is an amalgamation of three of them that went up to the Supreme Court.

So, now they're going to be back in the district courts. That's where most of the action happens in the federal judiciary. We're very focused on the U.S. Supreme Court, but this is going to -- this question remains in flux. People who were born to parents who are not citizens could have different status in different districts at this moment.

I do want to read to the point that Paula and Jeff were making. This is a good sense of why this is so important. It's a quote from the opinion that's on page five, written by Amy Coney Barrett. She's writing for the six-justice conservative majority, an expansion of presidential powers, a reduction in the powers of courts.

Here's what Justice Barrett writes. By the end of the Biden administration, we had reached a state of affairs where almost every major presidential action was immediately frozen by a federal district court. As the number of universal injunctions has increased, so too has the importance of this issue. And I think that's a nice encapsulation of why this is such a big win for the Trump administration and not just Donald John Trump the person, but the office of the president, whoever comes next is going to get the benefit of this ruling too. And it's going to make it much harder, not impossible, but much harder for a single district court judge in Maryland or Wyoming or where have you, to say, I'm blocking the president's action nationwide. It's going to be much harder to do that now.

CHALIAN: And isn't there a strategic victory, obviously, on behalf of the administration, back to those oral arguments that you were talking about, Pamela, by focusing this on the nationwide injunction issue and not the underlying birthright citizenship, which clearly does -- I know every scholar says it's not constitutional at its core, right, but does live on to fight another day and perhaps have some enforcement or enactment in the meantime.

HONIG: And this is part I've just started to sort of dig into the dissent, but this is part of what the three liberal justices say in dissent, we are going to end up with chaos. We're going to end up with a system where if you're born in New Jersey, you might have different status than if you're born on the exact same circumstances across the river in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia. And so that's one of the problems here, the practical problems. I think you're exactly right, David.

And, again, important to stress the dispute over birthright citizenship itself and Donald Trump's effort to not eliminate it but narrow it, that's for another day that, I think, will make its way back to the Supreme Court, but not this term.

BROWN: Right.

PEARLSTEIN: And I think -- or, excuse me, for, I think that's actually one of the critical points. This is not an end, this is the beginning. I think it's premature to declare victory for the administration in this. What this opinion is a full employment license for litigators. Now, this -- all of these cases go back to the lower courts. The Supreme Court appears to have said you can bring these cases as class actions. You don't have to proceed individually. But class actions are a complicated question as well. This is going to get litigated over time.

Now, it's consistent with the long game strategy, it was absolutely a strategic decision by the administration to bring it in this posture. They've prevailed sort of initially in allow -- getting themselves more time to pursue this. But it's not at all clear that this policy will succeed or ever actually be implemented.

[10:20:01]

It now depends what lower courts across the country do. This is coming back to the Supreme Court, but, first, more litigation over the coming year.

BLITZER: And Deborah Pearlstein is a constitutional law professor at Princeton University. So, you understand the constitution and you understand the ramifications of this major decision.

BROWN: Yes. And our Paula Reid wants to weigh in as well. Paula?

REID: Yes. So, we're getting reaction from inside the Justice Department. Of course, this case was argued by the Justice Department on behalf of President Trump and the administration, and it was argued by John Sauer. He is the same lawyer who successfully argued President Trump's immunity case last year where we were here, Pam, I think you and I were here together over here at the Supreme Court, and we're equally surprised by the enormity of that opinion in terms of its impact on granting immunity to sitting presidents.

And here, the attorney general, Pam Bondi, said that the Supreme Court instructed district courts to stop the endless barrage of nationwide injunctions against President Trump. This would not have been possible without the tireless work from our excellent lawyers at the Justice Department and the solicitor general, John Sauer. She says that the Justice Department will continue to zealously defend President Trump's policies and his authority to implement them.

Now, I know one of the panelists was just talking about how this will really be like sort of a lawyer-full employment act as we have this patchwork of response to executive actions and different rulings in different districts. But, again, it takes a long time to get a constitutional question or controversy before the Supreme Court.

And when we're talking a lot about these executive actions these will likely be able to be enforced in large parts of the country for quite some time. And when you're talking about something like federal layoffs or things they want to do with the budget or even birthright citizenship, I mean, this is something that could deter a lot of people from continuing their fight because it's going to take so long.

And that is why I am told President Trump's lawyers believe this is such a win. One of his top lawyers telling me, quote, so much winning that they have had at the Supreme Court so far, even though their policies are blocked at the lower court, getting them in front of this conservative super majority has proven to be very successful in the cases they have brought.

But this is the biggest one that they have been waiting for because it has such an impact on Trump's ability to govern through executive action even though, I do want to caution, they haven't weighed in on whether birthright, citizenship. Whether that can be limited, if Trump can do that through executive action, that's a constitutional question that will likely be back here before the justices in the next few years.

Sources close to the president have told me they're not sure they're going to win on the constitutional question there, but in the next few years, they can continue to try to limit that through executive action. And from their vantage point, that is another huge win from the conservative supermajority.

BLITZER: All right, excellent reporting from Paula. Stand by, Paula. I want to go back to former U.S. District Court Judge Shira Scheindlin, who's joining us from New York right now. So, Judge, you've had a chance to try to absorb the impact of this decision. Do you also see this as a huge win for President Trump?

SCHEINDLIN: It is a huge win not only for President Trump, but as everyone has said for future presidents too. It sets the new rules. But I want to say two things. Class actions, which has been mentioned, is still a way to affect a large group of people throughout the nation. So, I think you're going to see a lot of class actions brought, you're going to see certification of national class and it will affect everyone. So, that's one sort of workaround.

The other is state attorney generals. In the case that came to the Supreme Court, a number of state A.G.s had combined to bring a case. And I had listened to the oral argument. I thought there might be a distinction in their ruling between state A.G.s and individual plaintiffs.

So, as I said earlier, there's a lot we don't know yet. It's going to have to percolate, to use John Sauer word at the argument, it's going to have to percolate through the lower courts and we'll see the effect of class actions and state A.G. actions. We don't know yet the total effect of this, but it's obviously a win.

BLITZER: It's certainly a win for President Trump.

David Chalian, you're our Washington bureau chief, our chief political analyst, if you will. Give us a sense of the political impact that this Supreme Court decision is going to have as you see it.

CHALIAN: Well, I think the political impact would've been much greater had they ruled in his favor on the underlying constitutionality of the birthright citizenship matter but this is a victory that Donald Trump and his supporters are going to take to heart because they are going to see in this, with all the caveats that all our legal colleagues here have expressed, a more clear path to enact Trump's desired policies through executive orders perhaps and that not to be obstructed by a single judge in the lower court.

[10:20:01]

I would just also add, Wolf, this victory, and, again, we'll learn more in the percolating process, as the judge has described of its real world impact, but the clear victory that the Trump administration got today in this case add that to his very successful NATO trip with the countries this week about upping their defense spending, add that to -- we see no signs that his major legislative bill going through Congress is at real risk of not passing and getting to his desk for his signature, as messy as that process may be, a clear, bold decision for him to attack Iran and a clear successful military operation again while we await the full battle damage assessment and while we await to learn exactly how Iran may still have ability to rebuild its nuclear program and on what timeline, but the clear success of that mission. I would say this is a pretty good week for Donald Trump.

BLITZER: Yes, I think that's a good point.

HONIG: If I can add to that, a year ago, almost to the day was when the Supreme Court gave us the immunity ruling, saying that Donald Trump had broad immunity for actions he took during --

BLITZER: As a sitting president. HONIG: As a sitting president, right, during his first term, that was an enormous expansion of executive power. What's happening today is an even bigger one. Really, it's more systematic. Let me just read from the very end of the majority opinion, largely, almost entirely in the Trump administration's favor.

So, Amy Coney Barrett writing for the conservative 6-3 majority writes, some say that universal injunctions give the judiciary a powerful tool to check the executive branch. But federal courts do not exercise general oversight of the executive branch. They resolve cases and controversies consistent with the authority Congress has given them. In other words, this is the Supreme Court saying it is not our job, all of us federal courts, to be a check on every move the president makes. Our job is when the case comes in and it's Blitzer versus Brown, we decide the case as it relates to Wolf Blitzer and Pam Brown. We don't make broad pronouncements. We don't strike down nationwide policies again with certain very, very narrow exceptions.

So, this is a massive expansion of presidential power, executive power, again, important, keep in mind, not just Donald Trump's power, every future president, 48 and on. And I think it's actually a bigger, systematic expansion even in the immunity ruling we saw a year ago today.

BLITZER: And it underscores certainly how significant it is for a president to name Supreme Court justices, three of them Trump named, Justice Neil Gorsuch, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Justice Amy Coney Barrett. So, clearly, he's had a lot of influence.

BROWN: He had been complaining about Justice Amy Coney Barrett also, according to our reporting, and now she's delivering this.

HONIG: She has one against him, so has the chief justice, so has Justice Kavanaugh on several important cases in this term. But this is the biggest one.

And, look, it's a sad reality, but whenever you get a 6-3 ruling in today's court, people are going to appoint politics both ways. But the reality is the six conservatives in the majority here were all Republican-appointed. The three liberals, slip of the tongue there, but the three liberals, they're not Democrats, but they were all appointed by Democratic presidents.

And I know the chief justice, based on Joan Biskupic's reporting, really is concerned about this public perception that the court is politicized. But all the biggest rulings over the last several years have been 6-3.

BLITZER: Yes. Deborah Pearlstein is a constitutional law professor. How do you see the politics playing in all of this?

PEARLSTEIN: So, as you said, I'm a constitutional law professor, not a political analyst, but I will say maybe just one or two things. And one is what we're seeing now out of the court and the sharp polarization that you've just described really is new and it's historically new. So, when I clerked for Justice Stevens some years ago, right, Chief Justice William Rehnquist, a Republican appointee, was the chief justice of the court, but he was the one who wrote the majority decision for the court upholding Miranda versus Arizona, you have the right to remain silent case, despite having worked his entire career against that decision, right? He didn't like it. So, the kind of partisan splits that we're seeing in the court is a relatively new feature of the last decade or a little bit more.

The other thing to say is, you know, the majority, and again, this is why it's a long decision, it's why it's important to read it, you know, Amy Coney Barrett's decision concludes by noting the government's applications to partially stay the preliminary injunctions are granted, but only to the extent the injunctions are broader than necessary to provide complete relief. The lower court shall move expeditiously to ensure that with respect to each plaintiff, the injunctions.

So, there's an enormous amount of qualifying language. And when I say this is going back to the courts, the administration now has 30 days to actually issue its guidance for how exactly this is supposed to be implemented. They haven't done that yet. The state attorneys general, I think, who argued vigorously in front of the court that this is going to create chaos on the ground, will have more things to say. So, I think, again, this is sort of the beginning of the politics, not the end of it.

[10:30:00]

And before we go to break, a quick question, Elie, a practical question, for children born in the United States whose parents are undocumented.