General Discussion

Trump’s order, however, continues to fare poorly in the courts. NBC News reported:

A federal judge in New Hampshire granted class-action status to a lawsuit seeking to protect babies who would be denied birthright citizenship by the Trump administration and granted a temporary block of the order restricting birthright citizenship from going into effect throughout the country. The suit was brought on behalf of a pregnant immigrant, immigrant parents and their infants and had sought class action status for all babies around the country who would be affected by Trump’s executive order and their parents.

NBC News’ report added that the judge in the case “ordered a preliminary injunction temporarily blocking Trump’s order from going into effect, but stayed his order for seven days, allowing the government time to appeal” — which it almost certainly will.

The ruling in the case was issued by U.S. District Court Judge Joseph Laplante, who was appointed to the federal bench by George W. Bush.

While readers might’ve seen headlines about a related Supreme Court ruling last month, as my MSNBC colleague Jordan Rubin explained, the justices’ highly controversial opinion focused largely on the judiciary’s authority, not on the underlying constitutional issue and the legality of Trump’s order itself.

Within hours of the Supreme Court’s ruling, which left open the possibility of using class action lawsuits to challenge the White House’s policy, the ACLU filed just such a case. On Thursday morning, it scored a key victory. Watch this space.