'Outlandishly illegal': Law professor dismantles Trump press secretary’s federal court rulings claim

During a news briefing on Wednesday, February 12, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt railed against federal judges who are temporarily blocking President Donald Trump's executive orders — including an order calling for an end to birthright citizenship, which is protected by the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment.

Leavitt told reporters, "Many outlets in this room have been fear-mongering the American people into believing there is a 'constitutional crisis' taking place here at the White House. I've been hearing those words a lot lately. But in fact, the real constitutional crisis is taking place within our judicial branch, where district court judges in liberal courts across the country are abusing their power to unilaterally block President Trump's basic executive authority."

Joined by University of Michigan law professor Leah Litman, The New Republic's Greg Sargent was vehemently critical of Leavitt's "long, angry tirade" on an episode of the publication's podcast, "The Daily Blast," that was posted the following day.

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When host Sargent played a recording of Leavitt's comments for Litman, the attorney responded, "There's a lot to unpack with this statement. One is it's a little rich for this administration to come in and all of a sudden have a problem with district judges issuing nationwide injunctions against (a) president's policies. If you remember, the last four years of the Biden Administration — and, before Trump 1.0, the Obama Administration — it was district courts in Texas issuing nationwide injunctions against basically many of the things those presidents were doing."

During the press conference, Leavitt mentioned "12 injunctions" against Trump's executive orders. But Litman argued that 12 is a very small number in light of the "many absolutely outlandishly illegal things" Trump has done via executive orders during his second term.

The law professor stressed that Leavitt failed to show an understanding of how separation of powers works in the United States.

"I don't want to be overly rosy about what the courts are doing here," Litman told Sargent. "So I guess I'd push back a little on the idea that courts are stepping up here. In many of these cases, what courts are doing is just reaffirming the notion that in our constitutional system, Congress makes the laws — and that the executive branch is, in fact, subject to the law…. It's up to Congress about how to spend money and where money goes."

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Litman continued, "The executive branch was really asserting the authority to completely run roughshod over a coordinate branch of government. And you have the courts saying: Actually, that's not how this works. So they are stopping some of the more brazenly, transparently illegal instances where the executive branch is just disregarding Congress and acting in violation of congressional statutes."

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Listen to the New Republic's full podcast at this link or read the transcript here.