The most pressing constitutional crisis facing the nation today emanates not from the Oval Office but from courtrooms across the country. Federal judges, often in coordination with partisan activists, are systematically undermining the authority of the president. Congress can and must step in.  

If the balance of power between the executive and judicial branches isn’t restored, the consequences for both everyday Americans and American democracy will be severe. 

This is about determining our country’s true source of authority — the people, via their elected leaders, or a cadre of unelected judges who impose their own preferences upon the citizenry. In recent years, we’ve witnessed an explosion in judicial interference with executive action. During George W. Bush’s presidency, federal courts issued six nationwide injunctions Under Barack Obama, that number rose to 12. But during Donald Trump’s first term, it skyrocketed to 64 — and is now rising in the second. 

Nationwide injunctions, a tactic rightfully dubbed “judicial lawfare,” allows politically motivated groups to sue in hand-picked jurisdictions with sympathetic judges, who then issue sweeping rulings that effectively grind presidential initiatives to a halt, often before they even get off the ground. These rulings apply across the entire country, summarily overriding the will of the people and blocking policies chosen by Americans at the ballot box. 

Obviously, it wasn’t supposed to work this way, as anyone who’s taken civics in high school would know. The founders gave each branch of government distinct powers for a reason. The courts are supposed to interpret laws, not make them. Yet today, too many judges are deliberately playing the role of policymaker — and, thus, arguably tyrant — usurping the powers of the president and derailing the democratic process. 

Our way of life is at stake. When courts delay or derail executive actions meant to cut red tape, rein in bloated federal programs, or reverse harmful policies like DEI mandates, the costs fall directly on working Americans. Our taxes fund a sprawling bureaucracy that’s increasingly insulated from accountability. When a president, such as this one, tries to reform that system and unelected judges block him at every turn, the result is a government that’s even less efficient and less responsive. 

President Trump has made it his mission to scale back the colossal administrative state that taxes Americans to support programs they never backed and imposes burdens on job creators in the name of social engineering. But virtually every time he moves to implement change, activist judges throw up legal roadblocks. 

The president didn’t start this fight. He’s reacting to an onslaught of politically motivated lawsuits, many filed by state attorneys general and well-funded interest groups who see the courtroom as a weapon for policy warfare. Increasingly, these litigants don’t need to win at the Supreme Court; all they have to do is find a friendly lower court judge willing to issue a broad injunction. That’s often enough to delay, defang or outright destroy a presidential policy. 

This isn’t healthy democracy. It’s obstruction. It’s unconstitutional. And it hurts all of us. 

Fortunately, Congress has the duty and the power to remedy this situation. Under the Constitution, Congress controls the jurisdiction and procedures of the lower federal courts. That means it can pass legislation to restrict the abuse of nationwide injunctions, require expedited reviews for certain executive actions, and clarify the limits of judicial authority. Congress doesn’t even need to wait for the Supreme Court to act. Judiciary Committees in both chambers can launch investigations into overreaching rulings and expose their real-world effects. 

Legal scholars have already proposed a range of reforms, many of which are ready for legislative action. One such reform would mandate fast-track appeals whenever a judge issues an order that blocks presidential action under emergency powers granted by Congress. It’s absurd for the law to empower a president to act quickly only for a single judge to tie his hands for months or years while the case winds through the courts. 

The legal system was never meant to function as a national policy veto. Extraordinary judicial remedies should be rare and narrowly tailored to avoid overriding the political process. That process, while sometimes slow and frustrating, is still the best mechanism we have for balancing competing interests and expressing the will of the people. When judges short-circuit it, they erode trust in the legal system itself. Americans may not follow every legal battle, but they know something is off when a judge in one part of the country can override the preferences of millions. 

Congress must act, not to defend one particular president but to defend the Constitution. If judges are allowed to continue rewriting the rules of governance from the bench, we risk becoming a nation ruled by lawsuits rather than laws. That’s a fate that no American, regardless of party affiliation, should accept. 

George J. Terwilliger III is a Washington lawyer and previously served as deputy attorney general and acting attorney general of the United States.