Court Cases

Kekai Watanabe was brutally attacked in a prison fight and his tailbone was broken. For months, prison staff at the federal prison in Hawai‘i where he was detained denied his requests for hospital care, providing him instead with over-the-counter pain medication. Mr. Watanabe sued, seeking damages for his months of pain and suffering. Doing so is his only way to hold accountable the officials who ignored his repeated requests for care. But the government now argues that he has no right to sue a federal prison official. Although state and local officers who violate the Constitution in this same way could be sued for it, there's no federal law specifically creating a right to sue federal officers for constitutional violations, and so the government argues such suits cannot proceed. Using this type of reasoning, the Supreme Court in recent years has made it extremely difficult to sue federal officers. This rule creates a major gap in constitutional enforcement, especially here in D.C., where there is a huge federal law enforcement presence. Because of the Supreme Court's hostility toward claims against federal officers, for instance, our case seeking damages for the massive, unprovoked assault on peaceful civil rights demonstrators at Lafayette Square in the summer of 2020 is proceeding on very different terms against the federal officers than against the local officers involved in the same incident: whereas against the D.C. police we have been allowed to proceed as a class action and will be able to seek punitive damages, we could proceed only on behalf of a handful of individuals (not a class) for constitutional violations by the U.S. Park Police, Secret Service, and other federal defendants like former Attorney General William Barr, and we cannot seek punitive damages for the federal offers' violations. Together with the National ACLU and the ACLU of Hawai‘i, we filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of Mr. Watanabe at the Supreme Court. Even the Court’s restrictive recent decisions about suing federal officers acknowledge that Congress, in the Westfall Act of 1988, preserved the ability to bring some federal officer claims. When Congress legislates about a well-established legal concept, courts presume that Congress intended to incorporate that established meaning. At the time of the Westfall Act’s passage, courts permitted claims—like Mr. Watanabe’s—alleging unconstitutionally deficient prison medical care by federal officers. Therefore, to respect the instructions of Congress, the courts should continue to permit such claims today. A contrary result would be disastrous, and not just for Mr. Watanabe. One of the government’s main arguments here is that a federal-officer suit cannot proceed because federal prisons have an internal grievance process, known as the “ARP.” When appeals courts have applied this ahistorical limitation on what federal-officer suits are available, the results have been grotesque. For instance, the Eleventh Circuit recently relied on the ARP to reject a constitutional claim for fatally inadequate medical treatment of Hepatitis C in prison “even though [the plaintiff’s] estate could not use the ARP after his death.” Carrin v. Strong, 182 F.4th 1351, 1354 (11th Cir. 2026). The Third Circuit relied on the ARP to reject a constitutional claim for the failure to treat diabetic blisters that ultimately required the amputation of the plaintiff’s toe, even though the “effectiveness” of the ARP was “dubious.” Muniz v. United States, 149 F.4th 256, 258, 264 (3d Cir. 2025). And the Eleventh Circuit relied on the ARP in rejecting a constitutional claim for failure to treat an incarcerated plaintiff’s “severe but ultimately non-lethal physical injuries” even though “the district court found that he was denied access to the [ARP].” Johnson v. Terry, 119 F.4th 840, 858-60 (11th Cir. 2024). These outcomes are both unfair and contrary to what Congress directed when it acted in 1988. The Supreme Court will hear argument in this case November 9.

Once again, the Trump Administration is attempting to exert unconstitutional control over the content of expression—this time, by banning from the White House news organizations whose reporting has displeased the President. This unconstitutional ban follows previous violations of press freedom by the Administration, including restricting the Associated Press’s access to official events after the outlet refused to adopt the Administration’s preferred name for the Gulf of Mexico, and the government’s crackdown on press access to the Pentagon by those who would not agree to report only official handouts. (We filed amicus briefs in both those cases, also.) So once again, we (together with the National ACLU) are filing an amicus brief in support of the media’s First Amendment right to report as they see fit without governmental retaliation for news coverage the President doesn’t like. The President’s assertion of the power to banish journalists for disfavored coverage is an alarming part of a broader assault on free expression. The Administration has attempted to muzzle institutions like the bar, the academy, and the media that are at the heart of civil society and has retaliated against speakers of all kinds for espousing views the Administration dislikes. Our Nation’s history and other countries’ modern trajectories demonstrate the importance of upholding First Amendment protections here. When officials are allowed to punish media organizations for their reporting, repression and democratic backsliding often follow.

Once again, the Trump Administration is attempting to exert unconstitutional control over the content of expression—this time, by affording executive officials unbridled discretion to revoke Pentagon correspondents’ press access for receiving, soliciting, or reporting “unauthorized” information. In the fall of 2025, the Department of Defense promulgated a new policy granting Pentagon officials unbridled and standardless discretion to deem a journalist “a security or safety risk to [Department] personnel or property,” including on the basis of that journalist’s (or their news organization’s) receipt, publication, or “solicitation” of any information, classified or unclassified, that is not “authorized” by the Department. Under the Policy, such conduct—which is the bread and butter of independent journalism—is punishable by suspension of journalists' Pentagon access. Rather than subject themselves to these viewpoint-based restraints on their reporting and the limitless discretion of Administration officials to kick them out, New York Times reporters turned in their press credentials and sued, asserting violations of the First Amendment and due process. Thereafter, the new "Pentagon press corps" consisted of ideological allies of the Trump Administration. In January 2026, we and the National ACLU filed an amicus brief in support of the New York Times' motion for summary judgment. Our brief placed the Pentagon policy in historical and global context. We argued that American history shows that scrupulous protection of the press’s right to disseminate information, without fear or favor to those in power, is essential to our democracy. From early American history, to World War I, to the Second Red Scare, our country has regretted the moments it has faltered in protecting the free press. And we argued that developments in other democracies and former democracies highlight the dangers of allowing the government to infringe on speech and press freedoms. Across the world—including in the Philippines, Hungary, Turkey, and Russia—democracies have backslid into repressive regimes with few freedoms after their institutions failed to hold the line on free expression. The lessons from history and other nations' experience should strengthen courts' resolve to apply the First Amendment rigorously, especially when the Trump Administration is relentlessly pursuing ideological conformity by attempting to punish or silence disfavored speech by lawyers, students, government employees, and universities, as well as journalists and media outlets. On March 20, 2026, the court ruled for the Times and held that the Pentagon's new rules violated both due process and the First Amendment, because the policy did not "provide fair notice of what routine, lawful journalistic practices will result in the denial, suspension, or revocation" of a press credential, and because the policy discriminated against journalists based on their viewpoint, "that is, whether the individual or organization is willing to publish only stories that are favorable to or spoon-fed by Department leadership." The court's opinion began: "A primary purpose of the First Amendment is to enable the press to publish what it will and the public to read what it chooses, free of any official proscription. Those who drafted the First Amendment believed that the nation’s security requires a free press and an informed people and that such security is endangered by governmental suppression of political speech. That principle has preserved the nation’s security for almost 250 years. It must not be abandoned now." Accordingly, the court enjoined the Pentagon's new rules. In response, the Pentagon promulgated a new policy that further closed off Pentagon access and used new language to restore a regime similar to the enjoined policy. On April 9, the court ordered the government to halt the new policy as well, explaining that it would not "permit such a blatant attempt to circumvent a lawful order of the Court to succeed." On April 10, the government appealed both orders to the D.C. Circuit. In September 2026, we filed in the D.C. Circuit an updated version of our amicus brief in support of the Times in both appeals. The updated version of the brief contained an even longer chronicle of the Trump administration's crusade against disfavored viewpoints, as the attacks on protesters, civil society organizations, and journalists have continued. Our brief concluded by quoting Jefferson, who said, “[o]ur liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost.”

On July 31, 2025, the White House announced in a press release that it plans to build a ballroom funded by private donations at the site where the East Wing of the White House used to stand. The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit that was chartered by Congress in 1949 to preserve America's historic resources, sued and moved for a preliminary injunction to stop the ballroom project. It alleges, among other things, that the proposed White House ballroom project is “ultra vires” (in excess of) the President and Executive Branch officials’ authority under the relevant statutes. The district court granted the Trust’s motion for a preliminary injunction, holding that it established a likelihood of success on the merits of its ultra vires claim. The government appealed the district court’s decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Among their arguments, the government contends that the Trust cannot satisfy the demanding standard—a “Hail Mary pass”—that they argue applies to the Trust’s ultra vires claim. According to the government, the Trust must show that the proposed ballroom project is contrary to a specific prohibition in a statute, rather than simply showing that the project is unauthorized by the relevant statutes. On May 28, 2026, we filed an amicus brief in support of the Trust to refute the government’s argument that such a demanding standard applies to ultra vires claims. Under the default standard applicable in most cases, including this one, a plaintiff bringing an ultra vires claim is not required to show that a government official’s action was contrary to a specific prohibition in a statute. Instead, the plaintiff only needs to show that the official’s action was unauthorized by law. This default standard is over a century old and well-established in the Supreme Court’s precedents and supported by the D.C. Circuit’s precedents. By contrast, the demanding standard the government proposes for ultra vires claims should apply only where Congress has limited judicial review. Because there is no statutory limitation on judicial review of Plaintiff’s challenge to the proposed ballroom, the ordinary, default standard—rather than the heightened standard proposed by the government—applies. The standard courts apply to ultra vires claims is important because it can determine whether the party challenging unlawful executive action will win or lose its claim. Under the government’s position, any time a party alleges that a government official is acting without legal authority and there is no private right of action in a statute, the party would need to satisfy the heightened “Hail Mary” standard, making it highly unlikely it will win. Such a rule would undermine rule of law and separation of powers principles and improperly hamper courts’ ability to review executive action for compliance with federal law. We therefore urged the D.C. Circuit in our amicus brief to reject the government’s sweeping position and apply the ordinary, default standard to the Trust’s ultra vires claim. The D.C. Circuit held oral argument in this case on June 5, 2026. On August 7, 2026, the D.C. Circuit affirmed the district court's grant of the preliminary injunction in a 2-1 decision, holding that "[w]hether or not a massive ballroom should be constructed is for Congress to decide and is not a matter for Executive self-help."

On May 1, 2025, President Trump issued an executive order titled “Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Biased Media,” which directs the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and federal agencies to terminate all direct and indirect funding to NPR and PBS in explicit retaliation for the broadcasting organizations’ editorial and journalistic choices, which the order characterizes as “biased” and “partisan.” NPR and PBS each filed lawsuits challenging the executive order. On June 20, we ACLU filed amicus briefs in both cases (together with the National ACLU and the ACLUs of Colorado and Minnesota, where some plaintiffs in the cases are located), supporting the NPR and PBS motions for summary judgment, and arguing that the executive order constitutes a flagrant violation of the First Amendment because it retaliates against both speakers solely for their constitutionally protected speech, including the words they choose to use in coverage and what stories they choose to highlight. The briefs also argue that the order unconstitutionally restricts federal funding, including funds appropriated for local public broadcasters throughout the country to use as they see fit, based on President Trump’s disapproval of NPR’s and PBS’ news coverage. The briefs warn that the executive order threatens the editorial independence of local public broadcasters nationwide, undermines the congressionally mandated purpose of the Public Broadcasting Act, and endangers essential infrastructure like the Public Radio Satellite System, which reaches 99 percent of the U.S. population and plays a critical role in national emergency communications. On March 31, 2026, Judge Randolph D. Moss ruled in favor of NPR and PBS. He explained: “The President may, of course, engage in his own expressive conduct, including criticizing the views, reporting, or programming of NPR, PBS, or any other news outlet with whom he disagrees. The government may also fund its own speech and may fund government programs that promote specific perspectives on issues of public importance, and it may decide which views or perspectives to convey—and which not to convey—in any such government speech or program. And it may impose limits on federal grants to ensure that they are deployed to further the legitimate purposes of the program and may pick and choose among applicants based on legitimate criteria. But the First Amendment draws a line, which the government may not cross, at efforts to use government power—including the power of the purse—“to punish or suppress disfavored expression” by others. … As the Supreme Court and D.C. Circuit have observed on more than a dozen occasions, the government “may not deny a benefit to a person on a basis that infringes his constitutionally protected . . . freedom of speech even if he has no entitlement to that benefit.” … Executive Order 14290 crosses that line.” He issued a permanent injunction prohibiting the Trump administration “from implementing or enforcing Executive Order 14290’s instruction to cease funding NPR and PBS.” As a practical matter, the injunction will not restore all government funding to NPR and PBS, because Congress has defunded the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which provided a great deal of financial support. Some support comes from other agencies, however, such as the National Endowment for the Arts, the Department of Education, and even FEMA. Those agencies can no longer withhold funds pursuant to the Executive Order. The government did not appeal.

In August 2025, President Trump removed Governor Lisa Cook from the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors based on his determination that he had cause to do so. Governor Cook sued, arguing that the President’s decision to remove her violated her due process rights and was ultra vires (in excess of) the authority Congress granted the President because it was not “for cause” as required by the Federal Reserve Act. After the lower courts granted Governor Cook’s request for an injunction to prevent her removal, the government filed an application in the Supreme Court to stay (pause) the injunction. The government made two arguments in its stay application in response to Governor Cook’s ultra vires claim: first, that President Trump’s decision to remove Governor Cook is unreviewable in court because the determination of cause is committed to the President’s unreviewable discretion, and second, that even if a court could review President Trump’s decision, Governor Cook would face a demanding standard—a “Hail Mary pass”—to win on her claim. Specifically, the government argued that to prevail on her ultra vires claim, Governor Cook would need to show that that the President’s action was contrary to a specific prohibition in a statute, rather than simply that the President’s action was unauthorized by the statute. Together with the National ACLU and The Rutherford Institute, we filed an amicus brief in support of neither party to refute the government’s argument that such a demanding standard applies. We argue that the standard that the government proposes is a narrow exception to the default standard for ultra vires claims. Under the default standard, a plaintiff bringing an ultra vires claim is not required to show that a government official’s action was contrary to a specific prohibition in a statute. Instead, the plaintiff only needs to show that the official’s action was unauthorized by law. This default standard is over a century old and well-established in the Supreme Court’s precedents. By contrast, the demanding standard the government proposes for ultra vires claims should apply only where Congress has limited judicial review. The standard courts apply to ultra vires claims is important because it can determine whether the party challenging unlawful executive action will win or lose its claim. Under the government’s position, any time a party alleges that a government official is acting without legal authority and there is no private right of action in a statute, the party would need to satisfy the heightened “Hail Mary” standard, making it highly unlikely it will win. Such a rule would undermine rule of law and separation of powers principles and improperly hamper courts’ ability to review executive action for compliance with federal law. We therefore urged the Supreme Court in our amicus brief to apply the heightened standard the government proposes to Governor Cook’s ultra vires claim only if the Federal Reserve Act limits judicial review. The Supreme Court heard oral argument in this case on January 21, 2026. On June 29, 2026, the Supreme Court denied the government’s application in a 5-4 decision. The Court did not accept the government’s argument that the heightened standard applies to Governor Cook’s ultra vires claim. It instead applied the ordinary, default standard described above and in our amicus brief—whether the challenged action was authorized by law—to hold that President Trump failed to provide Governor Cook the procedural protections required by statute. Two Justices wrote concurring opinions, and four Justices dissented. Justice Thomas in his dissent listed the requirements of the heightened standard for ultra vires claims and noted that “[t]he Court also waives these requirements for Cook,” confirming that the majority did not apply the demanding standard for which the government advocated. The majority also rejected Justice Thomas’s objection to the lack of a statutory cause of action, noting that “[w]e have often held that plaintiffs may sue ‘in equity’ without a congressionally-provided cause of action ‘to prevent an injurious act by a public officer.’” Op. n.2 (quoting Armstrong v. Exceptional Child Center, Inc., 575 U. S. 320, 327 (2015)).

For four years, the White House provided American Sign Language (“ASL”) interpretation for its press briefings. It stopped doing so, however, in January 2025 when President Trump returned to office. This excluded deaf Americans, including Plaintiffs Derrick Ford and members of the National Association of the Deaf, from access to the White House press briefings. Plaintiffs sued and moved for a preliminary injunction to order the government to resume providing ASL interpretation during press briefings, arguing that the government’s failure to do so discriminates against deaf Americans in violation of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. The district court granted Plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction, holding that it established a likelihood of success on the merits of its Rehabilitation Act claim. The government appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. It contends that Plaintiffs are unlikely to succeed because, among other reasons, the court lacks power to enforce Section 504. Specifically, according to the government, Congress precluded judicial review of a Section 504 claim; and even if it didn’t, Plaintiffs should nonetheless lose because they do not satisfy the heightened standard for “ultra vires” claims—which the government describes as a “Hail Mary pass” and one that requires the agency to have acted contrary to a specific prohibition in a statute, rather than simply showing that the project is unauthorized by the relevant statutes. On June 2, 2026, we filed an amicus brief in support of Plaintiffs to refute Defendants’ objections regarding the enforceability of Section 504. We first argue that federal courts have inherent equitable power to enforce Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act based on courts’ historical powers, recognized by the Supreme Court, to prevent the government from violating the law, and that nothing about the Rehabilitation Act suggests that Congress intended to foreclose judicial review of Plaintiffs’ Section 504 claim. We also argue that a plaintiff bringing an ultra vires claim is not generally required to show that a government official’s action was contrary to a specific prohibition in a statute. Instead, the plaintiff only needs to show that the official’s action was unauthorized by law. This default standard is over a century old and well-established in the Supreme Court’s precedents and supported by the D.C. Circuit’s precedents. By contrast, the demanding standard the government proposes for ultra vires claims should apply only where Congress has limited judicial review. Because there is no statutory limitation on judicial review of Plaintiffs’ claim, the ordinary, default standard—rather than the heightened standard proposed by Defendants—applies. Whether courts can enforce laws duly enacted by Congress even in the absence of a statutory cause of action and the standard courts apply to ultra vires claims are important issues because they can determine the Executive Branch’s ability to get away with violating the law and whether the party challenging unlawful executive action will win or lose its claim. Under the government’s position, any time a party alleges that a government official is acting without legal authority and there is no private right of action in a statute, the party would need to satisfy the heightened “Hail Mary” standard, making it highly unlikely it will win. Such a rule would undermine rule of law and separation of powers principles and improperly hamper courts’ ability to review executive action for compliance with federal law. We therefore urged the D.C. Circuit in our amicus brief to reject the government’s sweeping position and apply the ordinary, default standard to Plaintiffs’ Rehabilitation Act claim. The D.C. Circuit has not yet scheduled oral argument.

On August 11, 2025, President Trump invoked a section of the Home Rule Act permitting him to demand services from the D.C. police for federal purposes, and began flooding the District with federal agents, D.C. National Guard, and National Guard from other states. With a month, the D.C. government sued Trump twice — first to block him from taking over the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department entirely (a suit that induced Trump to back down from that attempt) and then to challenge the deployment of the National Guard. The first case proceeded too quickly for us to file a brief. In the second (both are called District of Columbia v. Trump), we filed an amicus brief supporting the District's lawsuit. Together with our co-counsel Washington Lawyers Committee, and joined by a broad coalition of D.C. nonprofits devoted to serving D.C. residents and fighting for D.C. autonomy (Amica Center for Immigrant Rights, Bread for the City, Children’s Law Center, DC Appleseed Center for Law & Justice, Disability Rights DC, Legal Aid DC, School Justice Project, Tzedek DC, and Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless), we explained how this most recent attempt to impose on D.C. a law enforcement presence not democratically accountable to the people of D.C. is part of a long history, stretching back 200 years to the founding of the District and often tinged with implicit or explicit racism, of denying D.C. residents full self-governance. Although every other American city and state can take this basic element of representative democracy as a given, for D.C., it have been elusive and, even when obtained, only tenuously held. Setting loose American troops—locally unaccountable and not trained for domestic law enforcement—to police the streets of D.C. neighborhoods on the thin pretext of an “emergency,” is anathema to principles of democratic accountability and our longstanding norm of civilian, not military policing. Additionally, we explain how a locally unaccountable law enforcement presence is likely to be less trusted by the community and therefore less effective — thus showing that Trump's move will make D.C. less safe, not more. On November 20, 2025, the court held the deployment of the D.C. National Guard was unlawful in the absence of a request from the D.C. government because it is beyond the President's power under Title 49 of the D.C. Code, enacted by Congress. The court further held that the deployment of other states' National Guards to D.C. was not justified by the provision of federal law that the President invoked because it is limited to operations authorized by those states' laws. Accordingly, the court granted a preliminary injunction but stayed it for 21 days to enable the government to appeal. On December 17, 2025, the appeals court stayed the injunction pending the outcome of the federal government's appeal. In May 2026, we filed an amicus brief in the D.C. Circuit supporting the D.C. government's defense of the injunction on appeal.