Suits seeking continued US funding will likely be routed to Court of Federal Claims after SCOTUS decision, law prof says
A decision on Friday by the U.S. Supreme Court in a challenge to an education-grant freeze will likely redirect many other lawsuits regarding Trump administration spending decisions to the Court of Federal Claims, according to a law professor. (Image from Shutterstock)
A decision on Friday by the U.S. Supreme Court in a challenge to an education-grant freeze will likely redirect many other lawsuits regarding Trump administration spending decisions to the Court of Federal Claims, according to a law professor.
The Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision allowed the Trump administration to freeze $65 million in education-related grants while a suit filed by eight states is litigated.
The Supreme Court found that the government was likely to succeed in its argument that a district court lacked jurisdiction to order the payment of money under the Administrative Procedure Act. The law waives government immunity but not for court orders to enforce a contractual obligation to pay money along the lines of the order by U.S. District Judge Myong J. Joun of the District of Massachusetts, the Supreme Court said.
Instead, the Court of Federal Claims has jurisdiction to hear such suits, the high court said.
Writing at the Volokh Conspiracy, Josh Blackman, a professor at the South Texas College of Law in Houston, said the ruling “should quickly knock out many other ‘spending’ cases and redirect them to the Court of Federal Claims. This is a court most people have never heard of but will soon become very important.”
The Supreme Court’s decision stayed a March 10 temporary restraining order issued by Joun, report Politico, Reuters, Howe on the Court, the Washington Post and the New York Times.
Chief Justice John Roberts dissented from the decision but did not issue or join a dissent. The Supreme Court’s three liberal justices also dissented.
The Trump administration had canceled the grants because they included diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. The states that sued are California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Colorado, Illinois, Maryland, New York and Wisconsin.
Joun’s order had required the government to pay past-due grant obligations and to continue paying the obligations as they accrue. The judge based the decision on a finding that the challengers were likely to succeed on their claim that the freeze was arbitrary and capricious in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act.
The Supreme Court disagreed with that finding.
Generally, TROs cannot be appealed, but the order issued by Joun was more akin to a preliminary injunction, the majority said.
In a dissent, Justice Elena Kagan said the general rule is that Administrative Procedure Act suits go to federal district courts, even when a remedial order may result in the disbursement of funds.
“So the court’s reasoning is at the least underdeveloped, and very possibly wrong,” she said.
Kagan also criticized the majority for making a decision based on the government’s emergency application.
“The risk of error increases when this court decides cases—as here—with barebones briefing, no argument and scarce time for reflection,” she wrote.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson wrote a separate dissent, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
“It is beyond puzzling that a majority of justices conceive of the government’s application as an emergency,” Jackson wrote. “It is likewise baffling that anyone is persuaded that the equities favor the government when the government does not even argue that the lower courts erred in concluding that it likely behaved unlawfully.”
The decision is Department of Education v. California.
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