The Trump administration was sued at least 358 times in 2025 alone — more legal challenges than any president has faced in a single year in American history — and lost approximately 93 percent of the time when federal agencies were challenged on regulatory and procedural grounds. That staggering loss rate, documented by the Institute for Policy Integrity at NYU School of Law, means the administration failed in 79 of 85 cases involving Administrative Procedure Act violations, achieving a win rate of just 7.1 percent compared to the roughly 70 percent success rate that most administrations enjoy. Perhaps most damaging of all, multiple federal judges have openly questioned whether the Department of Justice can be trusted to tell the truth in court — a credibility crisis that one former federal judge called “remarkable and unprecedented.” These numbers are not partisan spin. They come from independent legal trackers at NYU, Democracy Forward, and The Fulcrum, each using different counting methodologies. The Fulcrum’s broader count puts the number at 530 lawsuits in 2025, with the variation depending on whether consolidated and multistate suits are counted individually or grouped together.
Either way, the scale dwarfs anything seen under previous administrations. Biden faced roughly 133 multistate lawsuits across his entire four-year term. Obama saw 30 to 40 in his first year. George W. Bush faced fewer than 20. This article breaks down what those lawsuits actually look like, why the loss rate is so high, and what it means when judges start saying they cannot trust the federal government’s lawyers.
Table of Contents
- How Did Trump Get Sued 358 Times in a Single Year and Lose 93 Percent of Those Cases?
- What Does It Mean When Judges Say They Cannot Trust the DOJ?
- The Deportation Flights Case and the Contempt Finding
- How Does the Loss Rate Compare Across Different Case Types?
- Why the Administrative Procedure Act Keeps Tripping Up the Administration
- The Role of State Attorneys General and Advocacy Organizations
- What Happens Next — The Long-Term Consequences of Lost Judicial Trust
- Conclusion
- Frequently Asked Questions
How Did Trump Get Sued 358 Times in a Single Year and Lose 93 Percent of Those Cases?
The raw volume of litigation against the trump administration in 2025 reflects the speed and scope of executive action taken during the year. In just the first 100 days — through April 23, 2025 — over 200 legal challenges had already been filed. Democracy Forward, a nonprofit legal organization that files many of these suits, tracked 358 lawsuits by year’s end. The cases span nearly every policy area: immigration enforcement, environmental deregulation, federal workforce reductions, education funding freezes, and attempts to dismantle or restructure entire agencies. Many of these actions were implemented through executive orders and agency directives that bypassed the standard rulemaking process required by the Administrative Procedure Act, which is exactly what made them so vulnerable in court. The 93 percent loss rate specifically measures cases where federal agencies were challenged for APA violations — essentially, claims that the administration skipped required notice-and-comment periods, acted arbitrarily, or exceeded statutory authority. The NYU Institute for Policy Integrity found the administration lost 79 of 85 such cases.
That is not a normal number. Under most administrations, agencies win around 70 percent of the time when their actions are challenged, because they follow the procedural steps that courts require. When you skip those steps, judges do not have much to work with in defending your position, regardless of the underlying policy merits. It is worth noting one important caveat: the 93 percent loss rate does not apply evenly across all courts and all case types. At the Supreme Court level, the Trump administration actually won favorably on the emergency docket, prevailing in 20 of 24 cases in 2025. This divergence matters. The administration’s strategy appears to have been to act fast, absorb losses at the district and appellate levels, and rely on a sympathetic Supreme Court to ultimately validate its most consequential policies. Whether that gamble pays off long-term remains to be seen.
What Does It Mean When Judges Say They Cannot Trust the DOJ?
The credibility problem is arguably more consequential than the loss rate. Federal courts have historically operated under what is called the “presumption of regularity” — the legal principle that government officials are assumed to be acting in good faith and telling the truth unless proven otherwise. Multiple federal judges concluded in 2025 that the Trump administration’s Department of Justice had forfeited that presumption, and they said so in written opinions. Judge Amy Berman Jackson was the most direct. In her March 28, 2025 preliminary injunction order in National Treasury Employees Union v. Vought, she wrote: “The court is left with little confidence that the defense can be trusted to tell the truth about anything.” That is an extraordinary statement from a sitting federal judge about the lawyers representing the United States government. Judge Zia M.
Faruqui put it in broader terms, writing that “trust that has been earned over generations has been lost in weeks.” These are not activist judges making political statements. These are judges explaining, in formal legal opinions, why they are no longer willing to take DOJ representations at face value. However, losing the presumption of regularity does not automatically mean the administration loses every case. What it means in practice is that DOJ lawyers now face a higher burden in court. Instead of judges accepting government assertions as reliable, they demand evidence. Instead of granting the usual deference to agency expertise, they scrutinize claims more aggressively. This makes even cases the administration might otherwise win significantly harder to litigate. For practitioners and legal observers, the loss of judicial trust is a structural disadvantage that compounds over time — every new credibility lapse reinforces the skepticism judges have already articulated.
The Deportation Flights Case and the Contempt Finding
The case that most dramatically illustrated the credibility crisis involved deportation flights to third countries. Judge James Boasberg ordered the administration to turn around planes that were in the process of deporting individuals in violation of a court order. The administration did not comply. Judge Boasberg subsequently found probable cause of criminal contempt, calling the administration’s conduct “willful disobedience of judicial orders” and describing it as a “solemn mockery” of “the Constitution itself.” This was not a routine discovery dispute or a missed filing deadline. A federal judge determined that the executive branch of the United States government had knowingly defied a binding court order and then provided misleading information about what had happened.
The contempt finding elevated the case from a policy disagreement into a constitutional confrontation about whether the executive branch is bound by judicial authority. It also sent a signal to every other federal judge handling Trump administration cases: verify independently, because you cannot rely on what DOJ tells you. The ripple effects extended beyond that single case. Judges in unrelated matters began requiring more detailed documentation, more frequent status reports, and sworn declarations from senior officials rather than accepting representations from line attorneys. A former federal judge publicly observed that both judges and grand juries were now doubting the credibility of federal prosecutors — a situation they described as having no modern precedent.
How Does the Loss Rate Compare Across Different Case Types?
The 93 percent figure from NYU covers APA challenges to regulatory and deregulatory actions, but the administration’s record varies significantly by subject matter and court level. Of the 530 lawsuits tracked by The Fulcrum, approximately 32 had been fully adjudicated as of their last reporting: 8 were decided in favor of Trump and 24 against, yielding roughly a 75 percent loss rate on fully decided cases. That is lower than 93 percent, but still far outside the norm for any administration. In education cases specifically, the record was closer to even: 26 wins against 28 losses, according to Ed Week’s tracking. This suggests that in areas where the administration followed more conventional procedures or where courts applied different legal standards, outcomes improved markedly.
The education cases also tended to involve state-level challenges with different procedural postures than the sweeping federal deregulatory actions that drove the 93 percent number. The Supreme Court picture is the starkest contrast. The administration won 20 of 24 emergency docket cases in 2025, reflecting a Court majority that was broadly sympathetic to executive power claims. This created a situation where the administration could lose repeatedly at the trial and appellate levels, then obtain stays or reversals from the Supreme Court. For anyone tracking these numbers, the lesson is that a single aggregate loss rate can be misleading. The administration was losing badly in the places where procedural compliance matters most, while winning in the court that has the final say on constitutional questions.
Why the Administrative Procedure Act Keeps Tripping Up the Administration
The APA requires federal agencies to follow specific steps when creating, modifying, or eliminating regulations: publish a proposed rule, allow public comment, respond to significant comments, and provide a reasoned explanation for the final decision. These are not optional formalities. Courts have struck down agency actions for decades when these steps are skipped, regardless of which party controls the White House. The Trump administration’s 93 percent loss rate is largely a story about trying to move faster than the APA allows. Many of the administration’s most ambitious policy changes were implemented through executive orders, guidance documents, or direct agency action rather than through formal rulemaking. Courts consistently found these shortcuts arbitrary and capricious — the APA’s legal standard for agency action that lacks adequate justification or fails to consider relevant factors.
Judges did not need to reach the question of whether the underlying policies were good or bad. They simply found that the administration had not done the procedural homework required to make those policies legally durable. This is a limitation that applies to any administration, though the scale here is unusual. The Obama administration lost several high-profile APA challenges, including the DAPA immigration program. The difference is frequency. When an administration attempts dozens of major policy changes simultaneously through informal channels, it generates dozens of APA lawsuits simultaneously — and the procedural deficiencies tend to be similar across cases, producing a high and consistent loss rate. Speed and legal durability are, under the APA, fundamentally in tension.
The Role of State Attorneys General and Advocacy Organizations
A significant portion of the 358 to 530 lawsuits were filed by state attorneys general, often in multistate coalitions. This tactic, which became prominent during the Obama years and escalated under the first Trump term, reached a new scale in 2025. Biden faced roughly 133 multistate lawsuits across his entire presidency. Trump exceeded that number in a matter of months.
Organizations like Democracy Forward played a coordinating role, both filing their own suits and supporting other plaintiffs. Democracy Forward explicitly stated: “Trump loses 93 percent of cases in court. We know, because we sue Trump and win.” That bluntness reflects a strategic calculation — publicizing the loss rate puts political pressure on the administration and may encourage other potential plaintiffs to file. It also highlights a structural dynamic: when an administration acts aggressively and cuts procedural corners, it creates an environment where litigation is not just viable but highly likely to succeed, which in turn attracts more litigation.
What Happens Next — The Long-Term Consequences of Lost Judicial Trust
The loss of the presumption of regularity is not something that resets automatically. Judges who have been misled tend to remain skeptical, and their written opinions create a record that other judges cite. If the administration continues to litigate at this volume, it will do so with an accumulated credibility deficit that makes every new case harder.
Future administrations — regardless of party — may also find that the institutional trust between the DOJ and federal courts takes years to rebuild. The Supreme Court’s willingness to intervene on the emergency docket provides a counterweight, but emergency orders are temporary by nature and do not resolve underlying legal questions. As more cases move through full briefing and argument at the appellate level, the procedural deficiencies identified at the trial court level will be tested again. The fundamental question for 2026 and beyond is whether the administration adjusts its approach to survive lower court scrutiny, or continues to rely on speed and Supreme Court intervention as a permanent litigation strategy.
Conclusion
The numbers tell a clear story: 358 to 530 lawsuits in a single year, a 93 percent loss rate on APA challenges, and multiple federal judges stating in written opinions that they no longer trust the Department of Justice to be truthful. These are not abstract legal statistics. They represent a breakdown in the normal functioning of the relationship between the executive branch and the federal judiciary — a relationship built on procedural compliance and institutional good faith that took decades to establish.
For anyone following government accountability, the practical takeaway is that legal challenges to executive overreach are succeeding at historically high rates precisely because the administration is not following the procedural requirements that make government action legally durable. The courts have not changed the rules. The administration is simply not following them, and judges — from district courts to the appellate bench — are saying so with increasing bluntness. Whether this pattern holds, or whether the Supreme Court’s emergency docket becomes the de facto final word, will shape the boundaries of executive power for years to come.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where does the 93 percent loss rate come from?
The Institute for Policy Integrity at NYU School of Law tracked federal court challenges to Trump administration agency actions under the Administrative Procedure Act and found the administration lost 79 of 85 cases — a 7.1 percent win rate compared to the roughly 70 percent win rate most administrations achieve.
Is 358 lawsuits in one year really a record?
Yes, according to Democracy Forward’s tracking. By comparison, Biden faced approximately 133 multistate lawsuits across his entire four-year term, Obama faced 30 to 40 in his first year, and George W. Bush faced fewer than 20.
Why do some sources say 530 lawsuits instead of 358?
Different tracking organizations use different counting methodologies. The Fulcrum counted 530 by counting each individual filing separately, while Democracy Forward’s 358 figure groups consolidated and multistate suits. Both numbers reflect the same underlying litigation wave.
Did the Trump administration lose every case?
No. The 93 percent figure applies specifically to APA regulatory challenges. At the Supreme Court level, the administration won 20 of 24 emergency docket cases in 2025. In education cases specifically, the record was 26 wins to 28 losses.
What does losing the “presumption of regularity” mean in practice?
It means judges no longer take DOJ representations at face value. Instead of assuming government lawyers are telling the truth, courts now demand independent verification and sworn documentation — making every case harder for the administration to win.
What was the contempt finding about?
Judge James Boasberg found probable cause of criminal contempt after the administration defied his order to turn around deportation flights. He described the conduct as willful disobedience and a “solemn mockery” of the Constitution.