A federal judge in Alexandria has refused to dismiss as moot a challenge to a proposed $1.8 billion compensation mechanism described by critics as an “anti-weaponization fund,” keeping alive a closely watched dispute over executive power, appropriations, and the legal limits of government settlement structures.

The plaintiffs, including Democracy Forward, had challenged the concept as an effort to channel large-scale payouts tied to claims by Trump political allies through an executive-branch mechanism rather than through a clearer congressional appropriations process.

The U.S. Supreme Court moved a major Trump-related dispute onto its docket, signaling that the justices are prepared to weigh in on one of the most legally and politically charged issues of the term: the challenge to President Donald Trump’s birthright-citizenship executive order and, just as importantly, the scope of nationwide injunctions entered against federal policy.

The case, Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, et al., Applicants v. CASA, Inc., et al., arises from litigation brought by CASA and states opposing the order.