Amidst concern about Trump, Sonia Sotomayor says ‘court decisions stand’

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor argued during a speech on Tuesday that court decisions stand, as some Democrats and members of the media suggest President Donald Trump may not abide by court decisions on his executive orders. 

“Court decisions stand whether one particular person chooses to abide by them or not,” she said. “It doesn’t change the foundation that it’s still a court order that someone will respect at some point.”

Sotomayor did not directly mention the president during her remarks at Miami Dade College in Florida, according to the New York Times. 

“Our founders were hellbent on ensuring that we didn’t have a monarchy,” Sotomayor added. “And the first way they thought of that was to give Congress the power of the purse.”

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“The court has proceeded cautiously,” the Supreme Court justice added. “It can’t get so far ahead of the society that the society rebels and ignores it, but it can’t fall so far behind the society to not do the right thing.”

Trump and his administration have criticized multiple court restraining orders on some of his executive actions related to a funding freeze and the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) access to personal data. 

Sotomayor also expressed concern about social media and said, “The internet is creating an extraordinary challenge to the press and to the world.”

“We’re going to lose our democracy,” she warned, unless, she added, young people took appropriate action. 

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Sotomayor criticized the Court’s 2024 presidential immunity case in her first public appearance since the start of the second Trump term earlier this month, saying it places the Court’s legitimacy on the line. 

“If we as a court go so much further ahead of people, our legitimacy is going to be questioned,” Sotomayor said during a Louisville, Kentucky, event. “I think the immunity case is one of those situations. I don’t think that Americans have accepted that anyone should be above the law in America. Our equality as people was the foundation of our society and of our Constitution.”

The Supreme Court ruled in July that a former president has substantial immunity from prosecution for official acts committed while in office, but not for unofficial acts.

Sotomayor notably wrote the dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, saying the decision “makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law.”

Fox News’ Haley Chi-Sing contributed to this report.