Nov 9 (Reuters) – The US Supreme Court gave President Donald Trump’s administration the green light on Monday to proceed with the construction of barriers along the US-Mexico border in a remote region in West Texas that includes Big Bend National Park, fast-tracking one of his longstanding priorities.
The court granted the administration’s emergency request to lift a federal judge’s order halting the border wall’s construction in the region while a lawsuit against the project brought by an environmental group and other challengers plays out. The Supreme Court used the doctrine to stymie some of Democratic former President Joe Biden’s key executive actions, but also in February to strike down Trump’s global tariffs — a major loss for him. Liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson was the only member of the court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, to publicly dissent from the decision.
“The government’s interest,” the court said in a brief ruling, “outweighs any aesthetic, recreational and environmental harm alleged by respondents. The lawsuit was brought by the Center for Biological Diversity, a Big Bend-area river guide and a group seeking to preserve a historic church in Ruidosa, Texas, that says its fragile adobe structure is threatened by the border construction. In Monday’s ruling, the Supreme Court said the law at issue likely precludes judicial review of the claims brought in the lawsuit. They claimed that Mullin and Noem exceeded their authority in issuing the waivers, including by running afoul of the so-called “major questions” doctrine, which the Supreme Court has used to invalidate executive branch actions of “vast economic and political significance” unless Congress clearly authorized them.
