Trump Admin Urges SCOTUS To Quickly Enforce Legal Victory As Deadline To Pay Out Billions Looms

The Trump administration asked the Supreme Court on Tuesday to intervene before it is forced to pay out billions in foreign aid funds.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals panel issued a 2-1 decision in August that an injunction requiring the administration to release the funds should be blocked. The injunction remains in effect because the full court has not issued a mandate to enforce the ruling.

“The funds subject to the injunction comprise tens of billions of dollars, some $12 billion of which would have to be spent before those appropriations expire on September 30,” Solicitor General John Sauer wrote in the emergency application.

The government is coming to the Supreme Court because the full D.C. Circuit’s inaction has left it “subject to an injunction that the panel held to be deeply erroneous,” Sauer wrote.

Nonprofit groups whose grants were terminated following President Donald Trump’s day-one executive order pausing foreign aid funding initially sued over the freeze in February. The D.C. Circuit panel found Aug. 13 that only Congress, through the Government Accountability Office (GAO), can bring lawsuits challenging the administration’s funding decisions.

The administration previously came to the Supreme Court in February when U.S. District Judge Amir Ali issued an order requiring the government to pay $2 billion in foreign aid within 36 hours. The majority ultimately declined 5-4 to block Ali’s order, over strong