07/11/2025

For Now, SCOTUS Allows Trump to Resume Mass Federal Layoffs

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) lifted a lower court order that had blocked President Donald Trump's executive order requiring government agencies to lay off hundreds of thousands of federal employees.

The order was unsigned. However, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who was appointed to the court by President Joe Biden, dissented. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a fellow liberal, concurred with the court's decision. The order did not make clear how the other justices voted, but they did say, "we express no view on the legality of any" plans to shrink the federal workforce, and it left open the possibility that the issue could return to SCOTUS.

Sotomayor, in her concurrence, wrote that the lower courts were free to address the constitutionality of the plans.

Please select this link to read the complete article from NPR.