Nearly all the universal injunctions blocking President Donald Trump’s agenda were issued by just five of the nation’s 94 federal district courts, a statistic that the administration said lays bare the Left’s strategy of lawfare.

Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi spoke at a news conference Friday just after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 6-3 decision that district judges, the lowest-level jurists in the federal system, cannot impose nationwide injunctions. Bondi noted that out of 40 nationwide injunctions issued since Trump retook the White House, 35 came out of five districts perceived as liberal.

‘Active liberal… judges have used these injunctions to block virtually all of President Trump’s policies,’ Bondi said. ‘No longer. No longer.’

Nationwide injunctions are court orders that prevent the federal government from implementing a policy or law. They have a cascading effect impacting the entire country, not just the parties involved in the court case, and have been used against the Trump administration at a vastly higher rate than previous administrations. 

Trump’s first administration faced 64 injunctions out of the total 127 nationwide injunctions issued since 1963, Fox News Digital previously reported. There were 32 injunctions issued against the Bush, Obama and Biden administrations collectively since 2001, meaning the first Trump administration was on the receiving end of double the amount of nationwide injunctions than his two predecessors and successor combined, according to an April 2024 edition of the Harvard Law Review. 

Bondi pointed to the five district courts – Maryland, Washington, D.C., Massachusetts, California and Washington state – calling it ‘crazy’ that such an overwhelming number of nationwide injunctions originated in those jurisdictions. Conservatives have accused the Left of bringing their cases in liberal judicial districts stocked with Democratic-appointed judges.

Fox News Digital looked at the five district courts and how judges in them have issued sweeping injunctions that have hampered Trump’s federal policies. 

U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland

The Supreme Court agreed this year to take up three consolidated cases involving nationwide injunctions handed down by federal district judges in Maryland, Massachusetts and Washington state related to Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order. 

The U.S. District Court for Maryland was one of the courts nationwide that issued an injunction against Trump’s January executive order to end the practice of granting birthright citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants. Maryland U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman issued the injunction in February following a lawsuit brought by five pregnant illegal immigrant women in the state, which was followed by other district judges in Washington state and Massachusetts ordering injunctions of their own. 

The Maryland district court also issued a separate preliminary injunction against the Trump administration’s executive orders ending federal support for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs in February. 

The court recently came under fire from the Trump administration when the Department of Justice filed lawsuits against each of the 15 federal judges on the Maryland federal bench earlier this month for automatically issuing injunctions for certain immigration cases. The injunctions have prevented the Department of Homeland Security from deporting or changing the legal status of the immigrant in question for two business days.

‘President Trump’s executive authority has been undermined since the first hours of his presidency by an endless barrage of injunctions designed to halt his agenda,’ Bondi said in a press release of the state’s automatic injunction practices.  ‘The American people elected President Trump to carry out his policy agenda: this pattern of judicial overreach undermines the democratic process and cannot be allowed to stand.’

U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California

Judges on the bench for the Northern District of California have issued at least six significant injunctions hampering policies put forth by the Trump administration this year. The Northern California district court includes counties such as San Francisco, Sonoma and Santa Clara. 

Back in March, Judge William Alsup, for example, granted a preliminary injunction ordering federal agencies to reinstate probationary employees fired under the Trump administration’s efforts to slim down the size of the federal government. Judge Susan Illston granted a temporary pause in May to the Trump administration’s federal reductions in force initiatives, and Judge William Orrick granted a separate injunction in April that prevented the Trump administration from withholding federal funds from areas deemed sanctuaries for illegal immigrants. 

Federal judges on the Northern California bench also issued injunctions to block the enforcement of Trump administration polices related to organizations that promote DEI and LGBTQ programs and to prevent the administration from terminating the legal visa status of international students. 

U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia

The U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has issued at least six signigicant injunctions against the Trump administration this year, including Judge James Boasberg’s March injunction preventing the Trump administration from deporting violent illegal immigrant gang members under the Alien Enemies Act – which received widespread backlash among conservatives.  

‘People are shocked by what is going on with the Court System. I was elected for many reasons, but a principal one was LAW AND ORDER, a big part of which is QUICKLY removing a vast Criminal Network of individuals, who came into our Country through the Crooked Joe Biden Open Borders Policy! These are dangerous and violent people, who kill, maim and, in many other ways, harm the people of our Country,’ Trump posted to Truth Social in March following Boasberg extending his restraining order against the use of the Alien Enemies Act to deport illegal immigrants with alleged ties to gangs, such as Venezuelan criminal organization Tren de Aragua (TdA).

Federal Judge Loren AliKhan issued a preliminary injunction in January barring the Trump administration’s freeze on federal grant disbursements through various federal agencies; Judge Paul Friedman blocked the Trump administration from targeting foreign service workers’ collective bargaining rights in May; and Judge Ana Reyes granted a nationwide injunction in March barring the Pentagon from enforcing Trump’s executive order banning transgender individuals from serving in the U.S. military. 

Judges on the court have also issued injunctions targeting the Trump administration’s plans to dismantle the federally-funded state media network Voice of America, and another that blocked the Bureau of Prisons from implementing a Trump executive order restricting transgender healthcare and accommodations for federal inmates. 

U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts

The U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts has issued at least four significant injunctions against the Trump administration this year, including the nationwide preliminary injunction barring Trump’s executive order ending the practice of granting birthright citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants. 

Other injunctions issued this year include Judge Julia Kobick this month blocked Trump’s presidential action requiring passports to reflect a person’s biological sex and not their gender identity, and another that involved the Trump administration’s efforts to end a Biden-era parole program for hundreds of thousands of migrants from Afghanistan, Latin America and Ukraine.

U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington

Ahead of the Supreme Court’s ruling limiting the scope of nationwide injunctions, judges on the District Court for the Western District of Washington issued a handful of injunctions targeting Trump policies, including joining courts in Maryland and Massachusetts earlier this year blocking Trump’s executive order ending birthright citizenship for children of illegal immigrants. 

Judge Jamal Whitehead issued a preliminary injunction in February halting Trump’s January executive order suspending the U.S. Refugee Assistance Program. While another federal judge on the bench in March granted a nationwide preliminary injunction blocking Trump’s executive order barring transgender individuals from serving in the military.

The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington includes counties such as King – home to Seattle – Snohomish and Clark. The two courts for the Western District of Washington and the Northern District of California are both in the 9th Circuit. 

Trump celebrated the Supreme Court’s ruling restricting the scope of federal judges’ powers to grant nationwide injunctions as ‘a monumental victory for the Constitution.’

‘The Supreme Court has delivered a monumental victory for the Constitution, the separation of powers, and the rule of law in striking down the excessive use of nationwide injunctions… I was elected on a historic mandate, but in recent months, we’ve seen a handful of radical left judges effectively try to overrule the rightful powers of the president to stop the American people from getting the policies that they voted for in record numbers. It was a grave threat to democracy,’ Trump said on Friday. 

SCOTUS’ ruling followed the Trump administration filing an emergency appeal with the highest court in March, when the then-acting solicitor general, Sarah Harris, sounded the alarm that nationwide injunctions had hit ‘epidemic proportions’ under the second Trump administration. She noted that the federal government faced 14 universal injunctions in the first three years of the Biden administration, compared to 15 leveled against the Trump admin in one month alone. 

Universal injunctions were also a sticking point for officials in the first Trump administration, who railed against the flow of injunctions ordered against the 45th president’s policies and laws, including the former chiefs of the Department of Justice. 

‘Courts issued an average of only 1.5 nationwide injunctions per year against the Reagan, Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, and 2.5 per year against the Obama administration,’ former Assistant Attorney General Beth Williams said in February 2019.  

‘In President Trump’s first year in office, however, judges issued a whopping 20 nationwide injunctions – an eight-fold increase. This matches the entire eight-year total of such injunctions issued against President Obama during his two terms. We are now at 30, matching the total number of injunctions issued against the first 42 presidents combined.’

Fox News Digital’s Andrew Mark Miller, Breanne Deppisch and Ashley Oliver contributed to this report. 

Sen. Thom Tillis, one of the two Republicans to vote against advancing President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill,’ plans to retire from the Senate at the end of his term.

The North Carolina Republican announced on Sunday that he would not seek reelection in the 2026 cycle. Tillis would have been among the most vulnerable Republicans running next year and faced threats from Trump to face a challenger after his vote against the president’s agenda Saturday night.

The lawmaker voted against advancing the bill and is likely to vote against final passage, because deep Medicaid cuts inside the colossal bill brought on changes to the Medicaid provider tax rate.

Tillis railed against the slow death of bipartisanship in Washington in a statement.

‘In Washington over the last few years, it’s become increasingly evident that leaders who are willing to embrace bipartisanship, compromise, and demonstrate independent thinking are becoming an endangered species,’ he said.

Tillis gave a shout-out to former Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema for their unwillingness to not ‘cave to their party bosses to nuke the filibuster for the sake of political expediency.’

‘They ultimately retired, and their presence in the Senate chamber has been sorely missed every day since,’ he said.

‘It underscores the greatest form of hypocrisy in American politics. When people see independent thinking on the other side, they cheer,’ he continued. ‘But when those very same people see independent thinking coming from their side, they scorn, ostracize, and even censure them.’

He said that the choice broke down to spending time with his family, or spending another six years in Washington navigating ‘the political theater and partisan gridlock.’

‘It’s not a hard choice, and I will not be seeking re-election,’ he said.

However, Tillis did give himself wiggle room to rebuke Trump over the next 18 months, as he did earlier this year when he refused to support Ed Martin, the president’s pick to serve as the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. The decision scuttled Martin’s nomination. 

‘I look forward to having the pure freedom to call the balls and strikes as I see fit,’ he said. 

His decision to retire tees up what will likely be a competitive race in North Carolina, and one that Democrats will look to pounce on quickly.

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesperson Maeve Coyle said in a statement shortly after Tillis’ decision that his choice ‘not to run for re-election is another blow to Republicans’ chances as they face a midterm backlash that puts their majority at risk.’ 

‘Even Tillis admits the GOP plan to slash Medicaid and spike costs for families is toxic – and in 2026, Democrats will flip North Carolina’s Senate seat,’ she said.  

However, National Republican Senatorial Committee Chair Tim Scott, R-S.C., contended that Trump would remain a huge factor in the upcoming midterm cycle given that he has won North Carolina three times and that the state has been represented by two Republican senators for over a decade. 

‘That streak will continue in 2026 when North Carolinians elect a conservative leader committed to advancing an agenda of opportunity, prosperity, and security,’ he said. 

It also comes after Trump spent much of Saturday evening blasting Tillis as a ‘grandstander’ and vowing to interview potential primary challengers, while Vice President JD Vance, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., and his leadership team worked over holdout fiscal hawks.

‘Numerous people have come forward wanting to run in the Primary against ‘Senator Thom’ Tillis,’ Trump said on Truth Social. ‘I will be meeting with them over the coming weeks, looking for someone who will properly represent the Great People of North Carolina and, so importantly, the United States of America. Thank you for your attention to this matter!’

A first-term House Republican and military veteran is eyeing a bid for Sen. Thom Tillis’ North Carolina Senate seat after the GOP lawmaker announced he would not run for re-election, a source close to the congressman told Fox News Digital.

Rep. Pat Harrigan, R-N.C., a former Army Special Forces Officer who was deployed to Afghanistan, was elected to represent North Carolina’s 10th congressional district in November 2024.

It comes after President Donald Trump pledged to find a primary challenger for Tillis over the senator’s decision to vote ‘no’ on a key procedural hurdle to advance the commander-in-chief’s ‘big, beautiful bill.’

Harrigan was elected to replace former House Financial Services Committee Chairman Patrick McHenry, R-N.C.

He’s among the first to express interest in Tillis’ seat in what could shape up into a crowded Republican primary race ahead of the 2026 midterms.

Rep. Tim Moore, R-N.C., another first-term House Republican, is also considering a bid for Tillis’ Senate seat, a source familiar with his plans told Fox News Digital.

Moore is the former speaker of the North Carolina state House of Representatives.

Tillis revealed he would not run for re-election in a bombshell statement on Sunday afternoon, criticizing the current political environment.

‘Too many elected officials are motivated by pure raw politics who really don’t give a damn about the people they promised to represent on the campaign trail. After they get elected, they don’t bother to do the hard work to research the policies they seek to implement and understand the consequences those policies could have on that young adult living in a trailer park, struggling to make ends meet,’ Tillis said.

‘As many of my colleagues have noticed over the last year, and at times even joked about, I haven’t exactly been excited about running for another term. That is true since the choice is between spending another six years navigating the political theatre and partisan gridlock in Washington or spending that time with the love of my life Susan, our two children, three beautiful grandchildren, and the rest of our extended family back home.’

The statement came on the second continuous day that senators are wrestling with the ‘one big, beautiful bill,’ a vast piece of legislation advancing Trump’s agenda on tax, immigration, energy, defense, and the national debt.

Tillis said he had objections to the bill’s spending cuts targeting Medicaid, arguing they would be damaging to rural communities and hospitals in North Carolina.

The senate voted 51-49 to begin debate on the legislation late on Saturday. Tillis and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., were the only two Republicans to vote ‘no.’

Trump posted on Saturday, ‘Numerous people have come forward wanting to run in the primary against ‘Senator Thom’ Tillis. I will be meeting with them over the coming weeks, looking for someone who will properly represent the Great People of North Carolina and, so importantly, the United States of America. Thank you for your attention to this matter!’

Senate Democrats’ delay tactic has finally come to a close, but Senate Republicans are still a ways out from voting on President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill.’

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., forced clerks on the Senate floor to read aloud the entirety of the Senate GOP’s version of Trump’s megabill on Saturday. In all, reading the 940-page legislative behemoth bled well into Sunday and took nearly 16 hours.

Schumer announced that he would be forcing the clerks to read the bill ahead of the ultimately successful, albeit drama-filled, procedural vote. And after forcing the reading of the bill, he said on X, ‘Republicans are squirming.’

‘I know damn well they haven’t read the bill, so we’re going to make them,’ he said.

It’s an oft-unused strategy Schumer and Senate Democrats deployed as part of the pain campaign against Republicans, who have iced them out from having input on the president’s agenda.

The last time Senate clerks were forced to read the entirety of a bill on the floor was in 2021, when Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., similarly objected and demanded that former President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Act be read aloud.

Now with the reading dispensed, lawmakers will trudge onward with 20 hours of debate evenly divided between both Democrats and Republicans. Senate Democrats are expected to squeeze every second from their allotted time, while Senate Republicans will likely only use a couple of hours at most.

That time on the GOP side will be used by those already critical of the bill, like Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. While his support for final passage is unlikely, he is not the only headache that Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., may have to worry about.

Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., is unlikely to change his mind and vote for final passage – despite Trump bashing him on social media and threatening a primary challenger – unless substantial changes are made to the Medicaid adjustments in the bill.

Tillis further steeled his resolve against the bill when he announced his retirement from Washington at the end of his term, opting against a likely grueling primary battle. 

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who supported the legislation through the first test, also wants to see real changes to the Medicaid provider tax rate.

Then there are the fiscal hawks who held the vote hostage on Saturday night as they negotiated with Thune, with the help of Vice President JD Vance, to get an amendment to make changes to the federal medical assistance percentage (FMAP), which is the amount that the federal government pays for Medicaid to each state.

Changes to FMAP are not popular among most Senate Republicans, save for fiscal hawks looking for steeper cuts in the colossal bill. 

Senate Republicans and Democrats remain divided on the Medicaid issue hours after President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ passed a key Senate vote Saturday night.

Sen. Jim Banks, R-Ind., and Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., both appeared on ‘Fox News Sunday’ to discuss Trump’s legislation in the wake of the 51-49 vote.

Banks argued that the Medicaid reforms would only affect certain people.

‘The Medicaid reforms would affect able-bodied Americans, those who are sitting at home who can work, who don’t work, who don’t have a sick kid or a sick mom, they shouldn’t receive Medicaid without working,’ he said. ‘And on top of that, the bill would take Medicaid away from illegal immigrants.’

Coons conceded there are states that are using their state funding to provide healthcare ‘for people who are undocumented,’ though argued that Trump’s $900 billion cuts to the program ‘are not about throwing people off of Medicaid who are not here legally.’

‘They are about imposing more and more requirements on the beneficiaries of Medicaid,’ the Democrat said.

Banks argued that taxes for everyday Americans will go up if the bill doesn’t get passed.

‘If we don’t pass this bill, everyone’s taxes on average will go up $2,000 a household, and that’s not fair to the regular Americans who work hard every day,’ he said.

Lingering concerns in both chambers about Medicaid — specifically the Medicaid provider tax rate and the effect of direct payments to states — energy tax credits, the state and local tax (SALT) deduction and others proved to be pain points that threatened the bill’s survival.

Coons, however, said that Americans who don’t believe the Democrats’ standpoint should listen to Sen. Tom Tillis, R-N.C., who, along with Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., voted against the bill.

‘Don’t believe me. Listen to Senator Tom Tillis,’ Coons said. ‘He’s been saying loudly this bill is a bad deal for the middle class. It’ll raise healthcare costs and throw millions off of needed health care.’

On Sunday morning, Trump slammed both Tillis and Paul on social media. 

Hours later, Tillis announced he would not seek reelection.

Following the vote, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., demanded that the text of the behemoth bill be read aloud before debates begin. After 14 hours, Senate clerks were still about 120 pages short of finishing reading aloud the 940-page text.

Once the reading is finished, the two parties will each get about 10 hours to debate on the bill. 

The timeline puts a likely Senate vote-a-rama on the bill in the early morning hours of Monday. A final passage vote could happen between late morning and late Monday night.

Fox News Digital’s Alex Miller and Fox News’ Tyler Olson contributed to this report.