The House said Monday it is appealing a judge’s ruling that the chamber couldn’t sue to stop President Trump’s border wall emergency declaration.
Lawyers for the House filed a notice of appeal with Judge Trevor N. McFadden, saying they disagreed with his ruling that the House, as a single chamber of Congress, didn’t have standing to ask the court to step in and referee.
The case will go to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
At stake is Mr. Trump’s effort to declare a national emergency and tap billions of dollars in Pentagon money to build hundreds of miles of border wall beyond what Congress explicitly approved.
The administration says Congress, while not giving the president exactly what he wanted in the 2020 spending bill, did give him powers to reprogram money within the government, and that’s what he’s doing.
The president’s critics say that’s backwards, and unless Congress explicitly funded a project, the president is going beyond his powers in spending that money.
A federal judge in California has sided with those critics, issuing a ruling last month putting the president’s wall-building plans on hold.
The Justice Department has appealed that ruling to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
