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Another unelected judge has decided they run the executive branch. According to court documents from the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, Judge William Alsup issued a preliminary injunction blocking the Trump administration from enforcing return-to-office requirements for Pentagon employees and extending it government-wide, preventing the Office of Personnel Management from directing agencies to recall remote workers.
Think about what this means. The President of the United States, constitutionally charged with running the executive branch, can’t tell his own employees to show up for work, as outlined in Alsup’s ruling. And the administration had been pushing to end the pandemic-era work-from-home arrangements that have become permanent fixtures for thousands of federal employees, a policy Trump campaigned on with a mandate from voters.
But the judicial resistance continues, as seen in similar nationwide injunctions from activist judges in blue districts. Taxpayers have been footing the bill for empty office buildings while bureaucrats collect full salaries from their kitchen tables, according to reports on federal spending. The administration will undoubtedly appeal, though every day these injunctions remain in place is another day the administrative state operates as an unaccountable fiefdom.
When did we decide that district judges get veto power over the executive branch? And how many more mandates from the American people will be nullified by judicial fiat before something gives? Providence watches over the bold.
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