<p class="p1"><span class="s1">The Supreme Court on Friday voted 5-4 to block a California judge’s attempt to stop President Trump from using Pentagon funds on the border wall.</span></p>
<p class="p1"><em><span class="s1">The Supreme Court broke its summer recess to approve the funds, which would have expired on September 30th. </span></em></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">The Court’s ruling gives Trump the go-ahead to use $2.5 billion on projects to rebuild existing border fences in </span><span class="s1">Arizona, California, and New Mexico.</span></p>
<p><em>The $2.5 billion adds to the <span class="s1">$1.4 billion Congress allocated for “primary pedestrian fencing” in February (Trump had asked for $6.7 billion). </span></em></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Wow! Big VICTORY on the Wall,” tweeted Trump. “The United States Supreme Court overturns lower court injunction, allows Southern Border Wall to proceed. Big WIN for Border Security and the Rule of Law!”</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">The Supreme Court&#8217;s decision is a major downfall for opponents who had challenged Trump’s use of emergency powers to obtain border wall funds that were not approved by congress. </span><span class="s1">Other critics are concerned about the wall&#8217;s potential effects on communities and ecosystems. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Today’s decision…will wall off and destroy communities, public lands, and waters in California, New Mexico, and Arizona,” argues Gloria Smith, an attorney with the Sierra Club. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><em><span class="s1">White House officials insist the wall projects are necessary to reduce drug-smuggling and illegal immigration. </span></em></p>
<p class="p1"><span class="s1">“Respondents’ interests in hiking, birdwatching, and fishing in designated drug-smuggling corridors do not outweigh the harm to the public from halting the government’s efforts to construct barriers to staunch the flow of illegal narcotics across the southern border,” argued Solicitor General Noel Francisco. </span></p>
<p class="p1"><em><span class="s1">Friday&#8217;s ruling sends the case back to the Ninth Circuit, but I doubt the lower court can get through the case faster than Trump can spend the money. </span></em></p>
<p><strong>Editor&#8217;s note:</strong> The ninth circuit appears to not care how many times they are overruled by the Supreme Court.</p>