Senate Republicans are urging President Trump to respect the rulings of federal judges who have blocked his executive actions to freeze spending federal grants and loans, dismantle the U.S. Agency on International Development (USAID) and ban birthright citizenship.
GOP lawmakers have been reluctant to criticize Trump’s actions, fearing it could make them targets for primary challenges next year.
But they are growing increasingly worried about the nation plunging into a constitutional crisis if Trump ignores court orders halting his most aggressive actions.
“The White House should comply with court rulings, the Congress should comply,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday.
“We have a judicial system. If you don’t like the ruling, you can appeal the ruling and you can follow that through. But we are a nation of laws and it is not necessarily for you or I to be the final arbiter here. This is why we entrust the judiciary with this responsibility,” she said.
Trump later on Tuesday said he would abide by court rulings, and that he would appeal those with which he disagreed.
“I always abide by the courts and then I’ll have to appeal it,” Trump said when asked if he would comply with court orders if they blocked his agenda.
He then expressed some frustration, saying judges were slowing his efforts to cut out waste from the government.
“But then what he’s done is he’s slowed down momentum. And it gives crooked people more time to cover up the books,” Trump said of judges issuing rulings against his efforts.
“The answer is I always abide by the courts, always abide by them. And we’ll appeal,” Trump added. “But appeals take a long time.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) on Tuesday said the growing tensions between the White House and federal judges is a “nature give and take” between the branches but added that the president must respect the judiciary.
“The courts have a way of mediating — or refereeing if you will — some of the disputes between the Article I and Article II branches of government. That’s what you’re seeing here,” Thune said.
“Do I believe that the courts have a very valid role and need to be listened to and heard in that process? The answer is yes,” he said.
Federal judges handed down five rulings on Monday alone blocking the administration’s actions, at least temporarily.
A federal judge in New York city ruled Monday that Elon Musk and a small team of engineers at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) could not access the Treasury Department’s sensitive federal payments system, which covers all federal expenditures, including Social Security and Medicare benefits.
That decision was met with widespread criticism from Trump allies, with Vice President JD Vance asserting on social media Sunday that judges don’t have the authority to control the executive branch’s “legitimate power.”
“If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal. If a judge tried to command the attorney general … how to use her discretion as prosecutor, that’s also illegal,” he wrote on X. “Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”
Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said the president should honor the checks and balances enshrined in the Constitution, which gave the courts the power to check both the president and Congress.
“We have three branches of government,” he noted. “In the first Trump administration, they honored the courts then.”
He emphasized the “administration has the ability to challenge” district court rulings by appealing to higher courts, including the Supreme Court.
But he said if a court makes hands down an adverse decision, the White House should comply with it “while they’re in the process of challenging it.”
Federal judges have blocked Trump’s executive orders banning birthright citizenship, freezing federal grants and loans and sending transgender women to men’s prisons.
They have also blocked Musk’s dismantling of USAID and his offer for federal workers to receive more than seven months of severance if they resign immediately.
A federal judge in Rhode Island ruled Monday that the White House failed to comply with his order to unfreeze billions of dollars in federal grants and loans.
He ordered Trump and senior officials in his administration to restore the frozen funding, writing that Trump’s order was “likely unconstitutional and has caused and continues to cause irreparable harm to a vast portion of the country.”
Some prominent Republican lawmakers, however, called on federal judges not to interfere with Trump’s and Musk’s aggressive moves to overhaul the federal bureaucracy.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters that judges should “step back.”
“The courts should take a step back and allow these processes to play out,” he said Tuesday morning.
Democrats have hailed the court victories against Trump.
“The courts have begun to speak, and their message is very simple: the law is not optional, not even for the president of the United States,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said on the Senate floor Tuesday.
He highlighted court rulings against Trump’s “attempt to freeze trillions in federal funding at [the Office of Management and Budget]” and “against his cruel decision to stop billions in medical research funding through [the National Institutes of Health.]”
Schumer counted “over fifty” preliminary court injunctions against Trump’s executive actions.
Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) argued that “we have to” follow court decisions, even though he acknowledged that Trump thinks he has authority to take the actions that have been challenged in court.
“I think it’s a very, very clear line between the powers that are there, that are appropriate. This president is saying, ‘I believe I have the authority,’” Rounds said. “You find out in a court of law and if they are appropriate, you move forward with them.”
Asked if lawmakers would respect whatever decisions are handed down by the courts, Rounds said, “We have to.”
“We will follow the decisions of the court and I don’t think there’s been anybody saying no,” he said.
Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), who previously served as Missouri’s state attorney general, predicted the court orders blocking Trump would be overturned on appeal.
“I think these are temporary restraining orders. These are very preliminary rulings that are going to get overturned,” he said. “These are all within the purview of the executive branch. These are not line-item budget items from the Congress.
“If this plays itself out all the way to the Supreme Court, I don’t think they’re going to be successful in their efforts to thwart the executive branch from minding their own store,” he said.
