Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) praised the Supreme Court ruling on Friday that limits judges’ ability to block the president’s policies nationwide.
In an interview on ABC News’s “This Week,” Graham acknowledged that both sides have tried to select judges that would be most sympathetic to their lawsuit challenging an administration’s action — but Graham said it’s appropriate for that practice to stop.
“A single federal court district judge has been able to enjoin policy for the nation, and [Supreme Court Justice] Amy Coney Barrett said that the equitable powers of a federal judge have limits,” Graham said.
Graham noted that Republicans, during the Obama administration, “actually did this.”
“We went to Texas and got a federal district court judge for a period of time to enjoin ObamaCare,” he added.
Graham said that’s not the way policy should be made.
“So, the ruling was, a single judge cannot stop policy for the entire country,” Graham said. “That’s beyond the mandate of a federal district court judge. You still have judicial review, but it has to go up the chain.”
“A single judge can’t stop a program for the entire country, and that’s a good thing, because people are going judge shopping,” he added.
Graham was pressed on the GOP’s past instances of going “judge shopping” to block federal policies they didn’t like.
“Totally,” Graham said. “I mean, and I’m here to say, judge shopping needs to stop.”
“We need to have a system where if you’re going to enjoin policy for the nation, it’s done at a higher level than a single judge, for the left or the right,” he said.
The Supreme Court ruling, along ideological lines, paved the way for President Trump’s executive order restricting birthright citizenship to go into effect in some areas of the country.
Ruling that three federal district judges went too far in issuing nationwide injunctions against Trump’s order, the high court’s decision claws back a key tool plaintiffs have used to hamper the president’s agenda in dozens of lawsuits.
“These injunctions — known as ‘universal injunctions’ — likely exceed the equitable authority that Congress has granted to federal courts,” Barrett wrote for the court’s six Republican-appointed justices.
