When it comes to the series of legal disputes that could be bracketed under the notional caption of President Trump v. The Deep State, the Supreme Court today is handing a win to the commander in chief. That’s the upshot in the high court’s reversal of a federal district judge at San Francisco, Susan Illston, who had sought to bar Mr. Trump from enacting mass layoffs across the federal bureaucracy. 

Judge Illston’s attempt, all the way from the Coast, to curb the president’s power to manage the employees of the executive branch was sweeping in scope. Her order stopped in its tracks Mr. Trump’s plans for layoffs affecting “tens of thousands of employees at 22 agencies,” the Times reports. The federales occupied desks at departments as far-flung as State, Housing and Urban Development, the Treasury, and even Veterans Affairs.

Mr. Trump had called on those departments, which are under his authority as the head of the executive branch, to prepare for reorganization in an effort to save tax dollars and achieve a leaner, more efficient workforce. Toward that end, the White House earlier this year announced that “the majority of federal agencies are likely to be downsized through restructurings, realignments, and reductions in force.” In short, a blow against the Deep State.

Not so fast, ruled Judge Illston. She ordered a halt to Mr. Trump’s plans, contending that Congress would have to weigh in before any mass layoffs could be undertaken. Mr. Trump’s solicitor general, John Sauer, sought relief from the Nine, arguing that while Judge Illston’s order “remains in effect,” the reorganization plan “is being halted and delayed, maintaining a bloated and inefficient workforce while wasting countless taxpayer dollars.” 

General Sauer’s argument had the better of it before the high court, if today’s order is any guide. Though unsigned, the ruling in Trump v. American Federation of Government Employees marks a vindication, at least for now, of Mr. Trump’s effort to clean house within the federal bureaucracy. The high court’s majority held that Mr. Trump “is likely to succeed” in the argument that, contra Judge Illston, his “Executive Order and Memorandum are lawful.”

Even a member of the high court’s liberal wing, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, agreed with today’s setback for the Deep State. She points out that the order in question by Mr. Trump “directs agencies to plan reorganizations and reductions in force” in a way that is “consistent with applicable law,” suggesting there is a limited justification for Judge Illston’s attempt to thwart the presidential downsizing.

Justice Sotomayor explains, too, that Mr. Trump’s specific “plans themselves are not before this Court, at this stage.” So the justices, she adds, “thus have no occasion to consider whether they can and will be carried out consistent with the constraints of law.” Justice Sotomayor signed on with the decision today, she wrote, “because it leaves the District Court free to consider those questions in the first instance.”

Justice Sotomayor’s remarks — alongside a more strident dissent by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson — are a reminder that today’s ruling, which merely lifts Judge Illston’s order, is not the final word on Mr. Trump’s campaign against the Deep State. “The President cannot restructure federal agencies in a manner inconsistent with congressional mandates,” Justice Sotomayor avers. The high court could yet hamper the president’s power on this head. 

To be sure, the high court has held that the president, per his responsibility to take care that the laws are faithfully executed, has power to remove, without cause, agency heads and other top officials. That power was articulated in a 2020 case, Seila Law v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and recently affirmed by the high court in disputes over Mr. Trump’s termination of agency heads and even board members of so-called “independent” agencies.

Yet Seila Law also confirms that Congress has the power to set “removal protections” for some federal employees. These include “inferior officers with limited duties and no policymaking or administrative authority.” Those protections could yet come to bear as Trump v. AFGE moves ahead in court. For now, though, amid larger concerns about the politicization of the judiciary, the Nine has handed the president a victory to savor.