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Supreme Court Considers Trump's Request to Resume Border Wall Construction
Confirmed
In Short: The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to lift an injunction halting construction of a border wall in Texas' Big Bend region.
The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to allow construction of a border wall and roads in Texas' Big Bend region, according to a filing by the Justice Department.
US District Judge Kathleen Cardone issued an injunction on October 2, halting work on the project until all applicable laws are complied with.
The Justice Department argues that the waivers issued by former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and current Secretary Markwayne Mullin are valid, as they found the region to be an area of high illegal entry, requiring additional barriers.
The lawsuit challenging the project was filed by plaintiffs including the Center for Biological Diversity and a Big Bend-area river guide, seeking to preserve the landscape, protect a historic church, and challenge the federal government’s waivers of environmental and historical laws.
The Trump administration’s request urges the Supreme Court to pause or overturn Cardone’s injunction, which has halted construction while the lawsuit plays out.
The emergency appeal comes after lower courts blocked officials from immediately carrying out the policy adopted after an executive order from President Donald Trump.
The government filed an emergency appeal asking the justices to throw out a lower court ruling that halted the project, a setback for one of President Trump’s signature efforts.
The Supreme Court has not yet responded to this appeal, and the case is pending review.
In the months leading up to the disastrous 2006 election, President George W Bush fired his press secretary, Scott McClellan, and withdrew the Supreme Court nomination of his close confidante, Harriet Miers.
The Supreme Court is also considering whether local governments can sue oil and gas companies for climate change costs.
The new Supreme Court term began on October 5, and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is expecting another busy term, possibly surpassing last year's record of six cases decided on the merits docket.
What this adds
The Trump administration's request to the Supreme Court is part of its broader anti-immigration policy to strengthen security on the border with Mexico.
Background
The Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to allow construction of a border wall and roads in Texas' Big Bend region.
The new Supreme Court term began on October 5, and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is expecting another busy term, possibly surpassing last year's record of six cases decided on the merits docket.
What's confirmed
- The Supreme Court has not yet responded to this appeal.
What's still developing
- “Even assuming that the secretary’s waiver authority implicates a question of ‘vast economic and political significance,’ Congress did clearly authorize the secretary both to build border barriers and to waive legal requirements in order to facilitate their expeditious construction,” the Justice Department wrote.
- Big Bend has about 805km (500 miles) of border, and, according to opponents of the project who have sued the administration, accounts for about 1 percent of migrant arrests.
- Because of how the 1996 statute is written, a challenge to Cardone’s order skips the usual appeals court and goes straight to the Supreme Court.
- The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that the Trump administration must continue providing gender-affirming care to transgender inmates in federal prisons.
- Less than eight months later, the Trump administration asked the same court to intervene after a federal judge ordered the Department of Education to continue funding grants that it had terminated.
- They started misgendering her, and they even removed the books with LGBTQ+ themes from the prison library.
- The decision keeps in place a decision from an appeals court last year that found former Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin had the authority to cancel the agreements, which took the death penalty off the table for the three alleged conspirators, CNN reported.
- He ran the race in 1980 – 11 years before he joined the Supreme Court – and clocked an impressive time of 3:11:00, according to the event website. (Thanks to Mark Walsh for sharing this discovery with the SCOTUStoday team.) On Tuesday, the Supreme Court denied a request for a stay of execution from William Reaves, who was sentenced to death for the 1986 murder of Richard Raczkoski.
- The Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to review a Trump administration policy denying bond hearings for immigrants as the government carries out a sweeping crackdown.
- SCOTUS approved the administration’s petition to reverse the lower court with a grant, vacate, and remand order reading, “Petition GRANTED. Judgment VACATED and case REMANDED,” the Rio Times reported.
- The Washington Supreme Court ruled September 17, 2026, that Initiative 2066 is unconstitutional in its entirety, according to the court’s majority opinion in Climate Solutions v. State of Washington.
- Khalil’s lawyers asked the justices to take up his case after the Philadelphia-based 3rd US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that federal immigration law barred a lower-court judge from ordering his release from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody.