Job Corps Suit Judge Narrows Injunction After High Court Ruling

A Manhattan federal judge reluctantly limited the scope of his injunction blocking the Trump administration from shutting operations at Job Corps centers nationwide.

Judge Andrew L. Carter Jr. of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York narrowed the current injunction so that it only applies to 31 of the 99 Job Corps centers and five training centers where the Trump administration plans to pause operations.

The Wednesday decision marks one of the first applications of the US Supreme Court’s June 27 Trump v. CASA Inc. ruling limiting the use of nationwide injunctions by lower court judges. The same question is being weighed by a Washington, DC-based federal judge in a separate lawsuit challenging the program’s wind down filed by a group of Job Corps students.

“I’m bound by the Supreme Court,” Carter said. He later added that he’s concerned about the other centers that will no longer be subject to the nationwide injunction he issued June 25 that blocked the administration from ceasing operations at all 99 centers. That decision came just days before the Supreme Court published its CASA opinion.

Attorneys for the National Job Corps Association argued that CASA shouldn’t apply because they’re seeking relief under the Administrative Procedure Act, which the Supreme Court opinion explicitly declined to address.

However, Department of Justice attorneys representing the US Labor Department said Carter didn’t set aside the agency’s action under the APA, but instead granted a preliminary injunction under the court’s “traditional equitable authority.”

The court “clearly applied equitable factors in its injunction decision,” said Jean-David Barnea of the US attorney general’s office, arguing in favor of paring back Carter’s injunction. The CASA ruling made clear that the court’s “equitable authority” is limited to providing relief to the parties themselves, Barnea wrote in a brief ahead of the hearing.

Carter agreed that the complaint made no reference to the APA and that he has to narrow the scope of his injunction. He also denied an on-the-spot request to stay his latest order until attorneys for the National Job Corps Association can amend their complaint and file as a class action or add APA claims.

“I can’t stay my decision because it would be keeping in place a nationwide injunction, which goes against Trump v. CASA,” Carter said, adding that it would be inappropriate.

Carter repeatedly urged the parties to engage in “in-depth settlement discussions” to avoid closing any of the centers. The federal government should use its “intellectual dexterity to multitask” and deal with the issues at these centers without shutting them down, considering that many of the participants have been abused or neglected and are seeking discipline and structure.

“The Department of Labor and the executive branch have enough strength to give these young people the tough love they’re seeking,” he said.

Hecker Fink LLP represents the National Job Corps.

The case is Nat’l Job Corps Ass’n v. Dep’t of Lab., S.D.N.Y., No. 1:25-cv-04641, oral argument held 7/23/25.