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Another unelected judge has decided they run the executive branch. According to a ruling from the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, as detailed in court documents, a Biden-appointed federal judge just blocked the Trump administration from enforcing return-to-office requirements for Pentagon employees—and every other federal worker across the government.
Judge William Alsup, sitting in San Francisco, issued a preliminary injunction, as detailed in the court’s filing, claiming the administration couldn’t force civilian Defense Department employees back to their desks. But he didn’t stop there. The ruling extends government-wide, preventing the Office of Personnel Management from directing agencies to recall remote workers to their posts, according to the same court documents.
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. A single district judge in California has decided that the administrative state answers to him, not to the voters who elected Trump to drain the swamp, as Trump stated in his campaign speeches.
The administration had been pushing to end the pandemic-era work-from-home arrangements that have become permanent fixtures for thousands of federal employees. Taxpayers have been footing the bill for empty office buildings while bureaucrats collect full salaries from their kitchen tables, a concern raised by reports from the Government Accountability Office. Trump campaigned on ending this abuse, and voters gave him a mandate to do exactly that, as reflected in his policy platform.
But the judicial resistance continues. This is the same playbook we’ve seen for months—activist judges in blue districts issuing nationwide injunctions to stop the administration’s agenda before it can even get started. Immigration enforcement has been blocked, as seen in rulings from other federal courts such as those in the Ninth Circuit. Spending cuts have been halted by similar judicial actions. Now basic personnel management is forbidden.
The administration will undoubtedly appeal, but the damage is done. Every day these injunctions remain in place is another day the administrative state operates as an unaccountable fiefdom, insulated from the democratic process and the President the Constitution puts in charge of it.
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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