Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Trump-appointed Justice Amy Coney Barrett sparked a MAGA meltdown Wednesday by siding with three liberal justices to reject the Trump administration’s request to withhold billions of dollars in foreign aid.
The administration had sought to renege on $2 billion in payments owed under existing USAID contracts. Now it must now comply with a Feb. 13 court order from District Judge Amir Ali and release the money after the Supreme Court went against President Donald Trump and refused to overturn Ali’s order.
That decision caused a MAGA meltdown, with Coney Barrett taking the brunt of the ire. Right-wing influencer Paul A. Szypula labeled her “disgraceful” and added that she is “a bad SCOTUS nominee.”
ADVERTISEMENT
“Looking that way,” conservative activist Charlie Kirk chimed in. In a similar tone, journalist Eric Daugherty called Barrett “a big problem.”
Multiple MAGA influencers, including Mike Cernovich and Jack Posobiec—who were among the group who received the bust of a Jeffrey Epstein binder last week—called Barrett a “DEI” hire.
“She is evil, chosen solely because she checked identity politics boxes,” Cernovich wrote. “Another DEI hire. It always ends badly.”
Hans Mahncke, a Substack personality with a Trumpian following, suggested that MAGA now has a “fight” on its hands. “The anti-Trump majority on the Supreme Court may have ruled that the federal government must pay for these canceled USAID projects, but that doesn’t mean the money should flow without a fight.”
He added: “This fight isn’t over—it’s just shifting to a different battlefield."
At one point during Trump’s address to Congress on Tuesday night, he shook the chief justice’s hand and said: “Thank you again. Thank you again. Won’t forget it.”
Roberts had paused the spending deadline implemented by Ali to allow the Supreme Court to review the administration’s request to side-step the lower court order. However, he chose to reject the government’s desired outcome on Wednesday.
Judge Ali had implemented a Feb. 26 payment deadline, before the case went before the Supreme Court. Wednesday’s decision was a 5-4 split against Trump, in a huge setback for the president.
The Supreme Court did not say when the funds must be released, with the original Feb. 26 deadline now passed. It instead instructed Ali to “clarify what obligations the government must fulfill to ensure compliance with the temporary restraining order, with due regard for the feasibility of any compliance timelines.”
The plaintiffs brought a case, scheduled for Thursday, concerning a preliminary injunction. Judge Ali currently has a temporary restraining order in place that lasts through March 10.
The Supreme Court has a 6-3 conservative majority. Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Brett Kavanaugh were the four who dissented Wednesday.
Alito, supported by the other three conservative judges, questioned Justice Ali’s jurisdiction over the case.
“Does a single district court judge who likely lacks jurisdiction have the unchecked power to compel the government of the United States to pay out (and probably lose forever) 2 billion taxpayer dollars? The answer to that question should be an emphatic ‘No,’ but a majority of this court apparently thinks otherwise,” Alito wrote. “I am stunned.”
