Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett sparred with U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer Thursday, pressing him on whether the Trump administration would follow federal court precedent. The exchange quickly became one of the day’s most talked-about moments and could reignite criticism of Barrett from Trump allies.

The back-and-forth took place Thursday during oral arguments in a case related to President Donald Trump’s effort to end birthright citizenship with a specific focus on whether lower courts should be able to block executive actions from taking effect nationwide. 

Justice Barrett, a Trump appointee, grilled Sauer about the administration’s stance toward lower court rulings, which followed similar lines of inquiry from her colleagues on the bench. 

‘I want to ask you about a potential tension,’ she began, before stopping to correct herself. ‘Well, no, not a potential tension, an actual tension that I see in answers that you gave to Justice Kavanaugh and Justice Kagan.’

Barrett then asked Sauer if the Trump administration ‘wanted to reserve its right to maybe not follow a Second Circuit precedent, say, in New York, because you might disagree with its opinion?’ 

‘You resisted Justice Kagan when she asked you whether the government would obey’ such a precedent, she said.

Sauer responded, ‘Our general practice is to respect those precedents. But there are circumstances when it is not a categorical practice, and that is not …’

Barrett interrupted, asking if that is the Trump administration’s practice or ‘the long-standing practice of the federal government?’ 

Sauer replied that it is ‘the long-standing policy of the Department of Justice.’

‘Really?’ she asked. 

‘Yes, as it was phrased to me, we generally respect circuit precedent, but not necessarily in every case,’ Sauer said. ‘Some examples might be a situation where we are litigating to get that circuit precedent overruled and so on,’ he added later. 

‘That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about this week,’ Barrett stressed, pointing to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals’ ruling that Trump’s birthright citizenship order is unconstitutional. 

‘And what do you do the next day, or the next week?’ she asked.

‘Generally, we follow this,’ Sauer said, which provoked a somewhat incredulous response from the justice.

‘So, you’re still saying generally?’ she asked him. ‘And you still think that it’s generally the long-standing policy of the federal government to take that approach?’ 

The remarks sparked divided political reactions on social media, with Democratic strategist Max Burns noting, ‘Trump Solicitor General D. John Sauer tells Justice Amy Coney Barrett that Trump ‘generally’ tries to respect federal court decisions but he has the ‘right’ to disregard legal opinions he personally disagrees with. Coney Barrett seems to be in disbelief.’

‘John Sauer just said the quiet part out loud: unless the Supreme Court tells them directly, Trump’s team might ignore lower court rulings,’ said Seth Taylor, a 2024 DNC delegate. ‘That’s not governance – that’s constitutional brinksmanship.’

‘Amy Coney Barrett (ACB) is proving once again she may the the worst SCOTUS pick ever by a Republican,’ conservative commentator and podcast host Cash Loren said on social media. 

‘She has a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court. … Yet you can hear her disdain for the Trump administration.’

Earlier this year, Barrett sided with three of the Supreme Court’s liberal justices and Chief Justice John Roberts in rejecting, 5-4, the Trump administration’s request to block billions in USAID money for previously completed projects. 

The decision sparked fierce criticism from Trump supporters, who have attempted to label Justice Barrett an ‘activist’ justice and someone who has been insufficiently loyal to the president who tapped her for the high court. 

Others have pointed out her track record as a reliably conservative voter and the fact the court has lifetime appointments to allow justices to ostensibly act without undue political interference. 

Trump later said he had no knowledge of the attacks against her, telling reporters, ‘She’s a very good woman.’ 

‘She’s very smart, and I don’t know about people attacking her. I really don’t know.’ Trump added. 

The court ruling could come in a matter of days or weeks. But it will likely hinge closely on the votes of two Trump appointees, Justice Neil Gorsuch and Justice Barrett, George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley told Fox News Friday. 

Overall, he said of the hearing, ‘it got pretty sporty in there.’

‘There were some lively moments, at least lively for the Supreme Court,’ he said, before noting the justices to watch are Gorsuch and Barrett.

‘Justice Barrett is probably the greatest concern right now for the Trump administration,’ Turley said. 

With the Supreme Court hearing its first case Thursday relating to nationwide injunctions – federal district court judges issuing rulings that affect the entire country – several proponents of a plan to end the practice are speaking out. 

Senate Judiciary Committee member John Kennedy, R-La., said it appears to be a case of the ‘tail wag[ging] the dog,’ in that it is the judiciary’s job to adjudicate the law, not create it.

‘When Congress makes a law, the federal judges are supposed to follow it. When the president exercises his power under Article II, judges are supposed to follow it, so long as it’s lawful,’ Kennedy said.

‘They can’t just overturn it because they don’t agree with it, and that’s what a lot of these federal judges are doing.’

In a Fox News Opinion piece this week, Kennedy noted ‘universal injunctions’ have been around since the 1960s, when judges began enjoining the government from enforcing certain policies against ‘anyone, anywhere’ – adding they let a judge say ‘sayonara’ to laws, regulations or even whims of a president they don’t like.

Kennedy noted that there have only been 27 such injunctions from JFK through Y2K. 

A review showed none was lodged against Presidents George H.W. Bush or Bill Clinton – but began to creep in during the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations.

With nearly 100 rulings against President Donald Trump in his one-and-an-eighth terms, Kennedy said some judges seem to want to ‘rewrite the Constitution every other Thursday, to advance some social or economic agenda that they can’t get by the voters: But the law is the law.’

‘And a universal injunction was created out of whole cloth. There’s no statutory basis for a universal injunction,’ the Louisianan said, echoing the analysis in his op-ed.

Given his penchant for often colorful and probing questions of judiciary appointees, Kennedy was also asked how an unfavorable ruling from the Supreme Court could affect nominee choices and further politicize the process.

‘All the nominees in front of us are going to be asked about universal injunctions, I can tell you. And if they try to dodge and bob and weave and run like a hound on the treeline, when it’s my turn to question them I’m not going to let them. I’m not asking how they would rule in a particular case, but I want to know what they think the legal basis is for a universal injunction, because there is none: I want to hear what they had to say.’

Sen. Tommy Tuberville – who joined Kennedy and others in supporting Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley’s Judicial Relief Clarification Act (JCRA) to end the practice – said such ‘woke’ judges should consider retiring their robes.

‘President Trump campaigned on a promise to deport dangerous criminals and won in a landslide. In just four months, he has already delivered the most secure border in American history,’ Tuberville told Fox News Digital.

‘Unfortunately, we have radical left judges who are allowing their personal beliefs to supersede the will of 77 million Americans who voted for President Trump and his agenda,’ the former Auburn football legend added.

‘If a judge wants to make political decisions, they should run for office. Otherwise, they should focus on upholding the Constitution and enforcing the law.’

Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, also said he supports the JCRA, calling nationwide injunctions ‘a real problem.’

‘[A] single federal judge can essentially stop a popularly elected president dead in his tracks by a temporary restraining order, which doesn’t just deal with the parties in front of the judge, but literally the whole nation.’

‘If the Supreme Court doesn’t do it in the context of this birthright citizenship case, then Congress needs to continue to pursue this via Senator Grassley’s bill and other means.’

While the case argued Thursday involves an injunction with regard to the interpretation of birthright citizenship in the law, Cornyn said that the court will determine the scope of that particular order, but that the idea of nationwide injunctions is being abused.

For his part, Grassley previously told Fox News Digital that such injunctions ‘are an unconstitutional abuse of judicial power.’

Israeli U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon condemned a United Nations official over remarks that he said ‘shattered any notion of neutrality.’

On Tuesday, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher accused Israel of committing genocide in his remarks before the U.N. Security Council.

‘Israel is deliberately and unashamedly imposing inhumane conditions on civilians in the Occupied Palestinian Territory,’ Fletcher told the Security Council on Tuesday. He went on to say that most of Gaza ‘is either within Israeli-militarized zones or under displacement orders.’

Fletcher, who heads the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), also described how Gazans are struggling due to a lack of supplies, as aid trucks have not been allowed to enter the Gaza Strip for 10 weeks. Hospitals are ‘overwhelmed,’ and people are facing famine and starvation, according to Fletcher. 

‘So, for those killed and those whose voices are silenced: what more evidence do you need now? Will you act – decisively – to prevent genocide and to ensure respect for international humanitarian law? Or will you say instead that ‘we did all we could?’,’ Fletcher said.

While much of Fletcher’s remarks focused on Gaza, he also condemned the ‘appalling violence’ increasing in the West Bank. The next day, May 14, a pregnant Israeli woman was killed in a shooting attack while on her way to the hospital to give birth. Tzeela Gez lost her life, but doctors were able to save her baby, who, according to The Associated Press, is ‘in serious but stable condition.’

In his response, Danon said Fletcher’s remarks ‘shocked and disturbed’ him, accusing the U.N. official of making an ‘utterly inappropriate and deeply irresponsible’ statement that ‘shattered any notion of neutrality.’

‘You had the audacity, in your capacity as a senior U.N. official, to stand before the Security Council and invoke the charge of genocide without evidence, mandate, or restraint,’ Danon wrote in his response. ‘As a senior representative of the United Nations, you are obligated to refrain from prejudging complex international matters. Yet, this is precisely what you did before the Council. You did not brief the Council; you delivered a political sermon.’

In response to a Fox News Digital request for comment, OCHA spokesperson Eri Kaneko said that ‘As Mr. Fletcher made clear in his Security Council remarks, it is for legal bodies to consider whether a genocide is taking place – Mr. Fletcher’s point is that the world must take decisive action to prevent genocide and ensure respect for international humanitarian law.’

When asked whether Fletcher was accusing Israel of deliberately killing and harming civilians, Kaneko said that the official’s words speak for themselves, as ‘not a single civilian in Gaza – teachers, artists, merchants, aid workers, hostages – has been spared.’

Danon questioned under whose authority Fletcher issued the accusation and said the U.N. official’s use of the word ‘genocide’ was a ‘desecration and subversion of a term with unique force and weight.’ He went on to say that what made Fletcher’s remarks ‘far worse’ was the fact that Israel had ‘engaged with you and your office in good faith at the highest levels.’

The Israeli ambassador concluded his letter by turning the questions around on Fletcher, telling the OCHA chief to ask himself whether he had done enough to prevent Oct. 7, accelerate the release of the hostages and hold Hamas accountable.

Kaneko told Fox News Digital that ‘Mr. Fletcher has repeatedly and publicly spoken out against what he calls the horrendous Hamas-led attacks and called for the release of the hostages. Mr. Fletcher was deeply moved by his visit in February to the kibbutz of Nir Oz, where one in four people were killed or taken hostage.’

President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ failed to pass the House Budget Committee on Friday, in what appears to be a massive blow to House GOP leaders’ plans to hold a House-wide vote next week.

Republican Reps. Chip Roy of Texas, Josh Brecheen of Oklahoma, Andrew Clyde of Georgia and Ralph Norman of South Carolina all voted against the legislation. 

A fifth House Republican, Rep. Lloyd Smucker of Pennsylvania, also switched his vote from ‘yes’ to ‘no,’ though it was a procedural maneuver that allows him to bring the legislation up again. Smucker told reporters he was ‘quite confident’ in the bill’s success.

House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, has directed the panel to reconvene on Sunday night at 10 p.m. for another vote.

The committee met to mark up and debate the bill, a massive piece of legislation that’s a product of 11 different House committees’ individual efforts to craft policy under their jurisdictions. The result is a wide-ranging bill that advances Trump’s priorities on the border, immigration, taxes, energy, defense and raising the debt limit. 

Emotions ran high in the hallway outside the House Budget Committee’s meeting room from the outset, however, giving the media little indication of how events would transpire.

Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, who had been at home with his wife and newborn baby, surprised reporters when he arrived at the Cannon House Office Building after he was initially expected to miss the committee meeting.

His appearance gave House GOP leaders some added wiggle room, allowing the committee to lose two Republican votes and still pass the bill, rather than just one.

But at least four House Republicans went into the meeting warning they were opposed to the bill.

Shortly before the meeting was expected to begin, Roy, Norman, Clyde and Brecheen abruptly left the room while saying little to reporters on the way out.

Each came back a short while later and criticized the legislation in their opening remarks.

The fiscal hawks are frustrated about provisions curbing Medicaid in the bill not going into effect until 2029, and had similar issues with the delay in phasing out green energy subsidies from former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.

‘Only in Washington are we expected to bet on the come that in five years, then everything will work. Then we will solve the problem,’ Roy said during debate. ‘We have got to change the direction of this town. And to my colleagues and other side of the aisle, yes, that means touching Medicaid.

At one point, Norman came out of the room and called for the committee to recess in order to work through the fiscal hawks’ concerns.

‘If they call for a vote now, it’s not going to end well,’ he said, adding he was still waiting on commitments from House GOP leaders.

Minutes later, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., who is not a member of the committee but had been meeting with holdouts, told reporters he wanted the legislation to advance through the Budget panel ‘as soon as possible.’

When asked about Norman’s comments, he said, ‘I just walked out of the meeting with him a few minutes ago as well. We’re working on some questions that Ralph and others have, and we’re going to be getting them answers as soon as we get them back from the Trump administration.’

Roy said on X after the vote, ‘We were making progress, but the vote was called, and the problems were not resolved, so I voted no. I am staying in Washington this weekend to deliver.’

‘Medicaid Work requirements must start NOW not 2029 & the Green New Scam must be fully repealed, as President Trump called for,’ Roy wrote on X.

Earlier, Trump took to Truth Social where he suggested those opposing the bill were ‘grandstanders’ and he pressed Republicans to unite behind it.

His message appeared to have little effect on the rebels, however — though it’s notable Trump is not in Washington, and is currently en route back from a diplomatic trip to the Middle East.

House Republicans are working to pass Trump’s agenda via the budget reconciliation process, which allows the party controlling the House, White House, and Senate to pass broad pieces of legislation while completely sidelining the minority party.

It does so by lowering the Senate’s threshold for passage from 60 votes to 51, provided the legislation deals with spending, taxes or the national debt.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has said he wants the legislation to pass the House by Memorial Day, with a goal of syncing up with the Senate and getting a bill to Trump’s desk by the Fourth of July.

That’s still possible if Republicans on the House Budget Committee strike an agreement to advance the legislation on Monday.

Afterwards, it would head to the House Rules Committee for any potential changes, before a House-wide vote sometime later in the week.

But Republican senators have already indicated they want to see some changes to the bill, meaning the House will need to hash out their differences with their counterparts in the upper chamber before the legislation is finished.

The House Freedom Caucus, which the bill’s four Budget Committee opponents belong to, has said its members would stay in Washington through the weekend to continue working.

‘We are continuing to negotiate. We are not leaving right now. We have been making progress and are continuing to work on the legislation,’ a Freedom Caucus spokeswoman told Fox News Digital.

President Donald Trump’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ failed to pass the House Budget Committee on Friday, in what appears to be a massive blow to House GOP leaders’ plans to hold a House-wide vote next week.

Reps. Chip Roy, R-Texas, Josh Brecheen, R-Okla., Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., and Ralph Norman, R-S.C., and Lloyd Smucker, R-Pa., all voted against the legislation. Smucker’s vote was a procedural maneuver that allows him to bring the legislation up again, rather than opposition to the legislation.

House Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, said the panel would likely not meet again on Friday, and could reconvene on Monday.

The committee met to mark up and debate the bill, a massive piece of legislation that’s a product of 11 different House committees’ individual efforts to craft policy under their jurisdictions. The result is a wide-ranging bill that advances Trump’s priorities on the border, immigration, taxes, energy, defense and raising the debt limit. 

Emotions ran high in the hallway outside the House Budget Committee’s meeting room from the outset, however, giving the media little indication of how events would transpire.

Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, who had been at home with his wife and newborn baby, surprised reporters when he arrived at the Cannon House Office Building after he was initially expected to miss the committee meeting.

His appearance gave House GOP leaders some added wiggle room, allowing the committee to lose two Republican votes and still pass the bill, rather than just one.

But at least four House Republicans went into the meeting warning they were opposed to the bill.

Shortly before the meeting was expected to begin, Roy, Norman, Clyde and Brecheen abruptly left the room while saying little to reporters on the way out.

Each came back a short while later and criticized the legislation in their opening remarks.

The fiscal hawks are frustrated about provisions curbing Medicaid in the bill not going into effect until 2029, and had similar issues with the delay in phasing out green energy subsidies from former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act..

‘Only in Washington are we expected to bet on the come that in five years, then everything will work. Then we will solve the problem,’ Roy said during debate. ‘We have got to change the direction of this town. And to my colleagues and other side of the aisle, yes, that means touching Medicaid.’

At one point, Norman came out of the room and called for the committee to recess in order to work through the fiscal hawks’ concerns.

‘If they call for a vote now, it’s not going to end well,’ he said, adding he was still waiting on commitments from House GOP leaders.

Minutes later, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., who is not a member of the committee but had been meeting with holdouts, told reporters he wanted the legislation to advance through the Budget panel ‘as soon as possible.’

When asked about Norman’s comments, he said, ‘I just walked out of the meeting with him a few minutes ago as well, we’re working on some questions that Ralph and others have, and we’re going to be getting them answers as soon as we get them back from the Trump administration. His questions were the same as Chips and a few others, and they’re very specific questions, valid questions we’re working on getting those answers right now.’

President Donald Trump slammed Bruce Springsteen as being ‘highly overrated’ Friday after the rocker called his administration ‘corrupt, incompetent and treasonous.’

‘I see that Highly Overrated Bruce Springsteen goes to a Foreign Country to speak badly about the President of the United States. Never liked him, never liked his music, or his Radical Left Politics and, importantly, he’s not a talented guy — Just a pushy, obnoxious JERK, who fervently supported Crooked Joe Biden, a mentally incompetent FOOL, and our WORST EVER President, who came close to destroying our Country,’ Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Springsteen tore into Trump on Wednesday during the first of a series of concerts in Manchester, England.

‘The mighty E Street Band is here tonight to call upon the righteous power of art, of music, of rock and roll in dangerous times. In my home, the America I love, the America I’ve written about, that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent and treasonous administration,’ Springsteen said, drawing applause from his audience. 

‘Tonight, we ask all who believe in democracy and the best of our American experiment to rise with us, raise your voices against authoritarianism and let freedom ring!’ Springsteen added in a video posted on his YouTube page. 

Trump said in his Truth Social post that ‘Sleepy Joe didn’t have a clue as to what he was doing, but Springsteen is ‘dumb as a rock,’ and couldn’t see what was going on, or could he (which is even worse!)? This dried out ‘prune’ of a rocker (his skin is all atrophied!) ought to KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back into the Country, that’s just ‘standard fare.’ Then we’ll all see how it goes for him!’

Springsteen declared last year that ‘I’ll be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz’ in the presidential election. Harris ended up losing the race to Trump.

The ‘Born in the USA’ singer, in an Instagram video endorsing Harris, attacked Trump as ‘the most dangerous candidate for President in my lifetime’ with a ‘disdain for the sanctity of our constitution, the sanctity of democracy, the sanctity of the rule of law, and the sanctity of the peaceful transfer of power.’

The Harris campaign later announced a concert series with Springsteen in battleground states to mobilize voters in the weeks leading up to Election Day last year.

Fox News Digital’s Lindsay Kornick and Brooke Singman contributed to this report.