Can a District Court Order Around a President?

FAIR shows core presidential actions are immune from injunction

(Sept, 4, 2025, Washington, D.C.) On Tuesday, the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) filed a brief ([link removed]) in the First Circuit Court of Appeals urging the court to vacate an injunction a lower court has issued blocking President Trump’s proclamation suspending the entry of foreign students seeking to enter the United States to attend Harvard.

The district court had concluded that the proclamation ending Harvard’s foreign student participation violated the First Amendment because the proclamation was motivated, in part, by Harvard’s toleration of the anti-Semitic speech of some foreign students.

The proclamation states many other reasons, however, and, as the government points out, it has a rational basis, and thus is valid under the Supreme Court’s ruling in the travel cases during Trump’s first term.

FAIR shows in its brief that the injunction also suffers from a deeper problem: When it comes to the exercise of a President’s core constitutional functions, including the conduct of foreign policy, courts cannot enjoin—that is, enter an injunction against—the President. This doctrine has deep roots in the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence. Under that same jurisprudence, the President has inherent authority to exclude aliens from the country.

FAIR also shows that the same immunity from injunction applies to the acts of subordinate executive officials carrying out a presidential order issued under his core constitutional authority. As the brief puts it:

Once President Trump issued his Proclamation, actions by other executive officials to carry it out became presidential actions clothed in his maximum authority. They became an exercise of the President’s core constitutional powers, as well as his delegated powers, and as such immune from injunction. The District Court abused its discretion by granting a preliminary injunction against any of these presidential actions.

“To say that the President can’t be enjoined, but those who carry out his orders can be, doesn’t compute,” said Christopher J. Hajec, deputy general counsel of FAIR. “A President almost always has to act through subordinates. He’s not going to do the paperwork excluding foreign students from Harvard himself. So those carrying out his orders have the same immunity from injunction that the President himself traditionally enjoys in foreign policy. We hope the court does not give district courts a veto based on policy disagreements over presidential actions in the area of foreign policy and immigration, and vacates this injunction.”

The case is President and Fellows of Harvard College v. DHS, No. 25-1627 (First Circuit).

ABOUT FAIR

Founded in 1979, FAIR ([link removed]) is the country’s largest immigration reform group. With over 3 million members and supporters nationwide, FAIR fights for immigration policies that serve national interests, not special interests. FAIR believes that immigration reform must enhance national security, improve the economy, protect jobs, preserve our environment, and establish a rule of law that is recognized and enforced.

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