On September 2, local time, Judge Deborah Boardman of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland issued a preliminary injunction blocking the Trump administration from implementing the new executive order signed on August 6, which aims to narrow the scope of “birthright citizenship.” This is the second time that Trump has been blocked by the judiciary for restricting this constitutional right; previously, the Supreme Court had rejected his first attempt in June.

Photograph: Archives of Hong Kong China News Service

Agence France-Presse reported that Bodman issued the order that day in response to a class-action lawsuit filed by immigrant rights organizations. In a 35-page opinion, she wrote that the Supreme Court has made clear that the children in this case who have been certified as part of the class action are “natural-born citizens.” She added that the order issued by the president on August 6 “is almost certainly unconstitutional.”

The Maryland-based immigrant rights organization We Are CASA welcomed the ruling. Shana Hald, the organization’s legal director, stated: “In its attacks on ‘birthright citizenship,’ the Trump administration has lost in lower courts, lost in the Supreme Court, and today it has lost again.”

On August 6, President Trump signed two executive orders focusing on what he termed “birth tourism”—foreign nationals entering the United States on nonimmigrant visas with the primary purpose of giving birth to their children, thereby enabling those children to acquire U.S. citizenship by virtue of the principle of jus soli. The orders also stipulate that certain foreign-born children are not eligible for “birthright citizenship,” including the children of foreign government officials stationed in the United States and the children of members of “foreign terrorist organizations.”

This is not the first time that President Trump has signed an executive order concerning “birthright citizenship.” On the first day of his return to the White House last January, he signed an executive order stating that children born to parents who are illegally overstaying their visas or holding temporary visas do not automatically become U.S. citizens. Several lower federal courts ruled that the order violated the Fourteenth Amendment, and on June 30, the Supreme Court unanimously declined to uphold it.

Restricting “birthright citizenship” is part of Trump’s broader immigration-control strategy. In addition to pushing for the deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants, his administration also revoked Deferred Enforced Departure status for citizens from more than ten countries. Opponents argue that the executive branch has repeatedly circumvented and eroded constitutional rights, which could very likely lead to the dispute being brought back before the Supreme Court.