Proposed Legislative Limits on Nationwide Injunctions

In litigation against the federal government, judicial orders known as nationwide injunctions—sometimes referred to as “universal injunctions” or “nonparty injunctions”—generally prohibit the executive branch from enforcing the challenged policy or action against anyone, whether a party in the case or not. Once a relative rarity in federal litigation, federal district courts have granted this remedy increasingly since the turn of the millennium, especially since the beginning of the first Trump administration.

With the increasing prevalence of nationwide injunctions has come increased attention—and increased debate across the ideological spectrum. During the Biden administration, the U.S. Solicitor General asked the U.S. Supreme Court to address whether this remedy is permissible, but the Court thus far has sidestepped the question (though several Justices have written separately over the past few years to question the lawfulness of nationwide injunctions). But the issue may be coming to a head now, in the first few months of the second Trump administration. Several federal district courts have already entered nationwide injunctions against some of the administration’s executive actions that have been challenged in court. The President and his deputies have been railing against the practice in the media. And in several applications for emergency relief from those injunctions, the Acting Solicitor General has already asked the Supreme Court to take up the question of their legality.

In the meantime, Congress could act to scale back the use of nationwide injunctions and mitigate or even moot the prospect of Supreme Court intervention. The Constitution grants Congress the authority to create “inferior Courts” to the Supreme Court, and inherent within this broader authority is the narrower power generally to regulate and limit the jurisdiction of those courts and the remedies they may grant in cases before them.

Efforts to do just that are making their way through Congress. This past February, Representative Darrell Issa introduced a bill, titled the “No Rogue Rulings Act,” that would generally prohibit federal district courts from entering “any order providing for injunctive relief” except insofar as such relief is “applicable only to limit the actions of a party to the case before such district court with respect to the party seeking injunctive relief from such district court.” In other words, the bill would still allow federal courts to enter injunctions, but only if they are limited in their scope to the parties in the case. That bill, as amended, has already been voted out of the House Judiciary Committee; and the House Majority Leader has declared his intent to bring the bill to the House floor the week of March 31. Meanwhile, in the Senate on March 24, Senator Josh Hawley introduced companion legislation, titled the “Nationwide Injunction Abuse Prevention Act of 2025,” that prohibits federal district courts from issuing injunctions unless they are “applicable only to” either “a party to the case before the district court” or “the judicial district of the district court.”

Time will tell whether there are enough votes in each chamber to enact such a measure into law at this time. And even if there are, carveouts to the general prohibition in the bills could still leave room for the Supreme Court to address whether nonparty injunctions are ever constitutionally permissible. For instance, the House bill as amended in committee allows for three-judge district courts to enter nationwide injunctions in cases brought by two or more states located in different federal circuits; Senator Hawley’s proposed bill allows for injunctions that apply to the judicial district of the issuing court in addition to injunctions that are more narrowly limited to the parties in the case; and similar, additional, or alternative carveouts could imaginably be adopted before final passage (for example, last Congress, Senator Mazie Hirono introduced a bill that would give the federal district court in DC exclusive original jurisdiction over lawsuits seeking nationwide injunctions).

Regardless, unless or until the Supreme Court addresses the issue squarely, supporters and opponents of the nationwide injunction should keep an eye on whether and how Congress acts to limit federal district court authority in this space.