Hand­ing Attor­ney Gen­er­al Bob Fer­gu­son a pre­lim­i­nary vic­to­ry in his efforts to stop neo­fas­cist Don­ald Trump from stomp­ing all over the Unit­ed States Con­sti­tu­tion and fed­er­al law, U.S. Fed­er­al Dis­trict Court Judge Judge James L. Robart today grant­ed the State of Wash­ing­ton’s request for a tem­po­rary restrain­ing order block­ing imple­men­ta­tion of key pro­vi­sions of Trump’s exec­u­tive order on immi­gra­tion, includ­ing those sec­tions that ban immi­gra­tion from cer­tain countries.

Robart’s deci­sion will affect the entire coun­try, not just the Pacif­ic North­west or the States of Wash­ing­ton and Min­neso­ta (Min­neso­ta joined the suit yesterday).

“The Con­sti­tu­tion pre­vailed today,” Fer­gu­son said in a state­ment hail­ing the deci­sion. “No one is above the law — not even the President.”

The news release went on to say:

The Tem­po­rary Restrain­ing Order will remain in place until U.S. Dis­trict Court Senior Judge James L. Robart con­sid­ers the Attor­ney General’s law­suit chal­leng­ing key pro­vi­sions of the President’s order as ille­gal and uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. If Fer­gu­son pre­vails, the Exec­u­tive Order would be per­ma­nent­ly inval­i­dat­ed nationwide.

To obtain the Tem­po­rary Restrain­ing Order, the state need­ed to prove that its under­ly­ing law­suit was like­ly to suc­ceed, that irrepara­ble harm was like­ly to occur with­out the restrain­ing order, and that halt­ing the President’s order imme­di­ate­ly is in the pub­lic interest.

The State also need­ed to estab­lish that the poten­tial injury to Wash­ing­ton res­i­dents caused by leav­ing the President’s order in place out­weighs any poten­tial dam­age from halt­ing it.

Judge Robart, who was nom­i­nat­ed to the court by Pres­i­dent George W. Bush in 2003, ruled that Fer­gu­son had met the high stan­dards nec­es­sary to block the Exec­u­tive Order until the court reach­es the mer­its of the lawsuit.

“This is a tremen­dous vic­to­ry for the State of Wash­ing­ton,” said Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee in a sep­a­rate state­ment. “Thank you to AG Fer­gu­son and his team for mak­ing the case that no per­son – not even the pres­i­dent – is above the law.”

“There is still more to do,” the Gov­er­nor added. “The fight isn’t yet won. But we should feel heart­ened by today’s vic­to­ry and more res­olute than ever that we are fight­ing on the right side of history.”

NPI con­grat­u­lates Attor­ney Gen­er­al Bob Fer­gu­son on today’s vic­to­ry and wish­es his office suc­cess in obtain­ing a per­ma­nent injunction.

Today’s vic­to­ry is a reminder that abus­es of pow­er can be stopped. Amer­i­ca is a coun­try of laws. Our Founders gave us a sys­tem of gov­ern­ment with checks and bal­ances. It is the respon­si­bil­i­ty of the judi­cial branch to inter­pret the law and ensure the exec­u­tive branch does not over­step its authority.

Today, Judge Robart upheld his oath to defend the Con­sti­tu­tion of the Unit­ed States against all ene­mies, for­eign and domestic.

We thank him for grant­i­ng the tem­po­rary restrain­ing order and urge him to grant Fer­gu­son’s prayer for relief in the under­ly­ing lawsuit.