Hyperventilating ran heavy in June after the Supreme Court issued its ruling that courts had been too profligate in using nationwide injunctions to stop the president, and ordered lower judges to cool it.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor called the decision an “invitation … to bypass the Constitution.” A law professor called it a “major blow” to the judicial branch’s ability to stop a president. One media outlet called the ruling a “blockbuster” victory for President Trump.

Three months later, though, the ruling has largely fizzled, with judges still finding plenty of room to shut down Mr. Trump without resorting to the kind of nationwide, or universal, injunctions the high court criticized.

Some judges shifted to using class action lawsuits to stop presidential action. Others turned to what’s known as “vacatur,” where a government policy can be erased root and branch. And still others said the cases in front of them were special enough that they demanded nationwide injunctions, notwithstanding the Supreme Court’s scolding in the June ruling in CASA v. Trump.

“CASA decisively rejected the universal injunction. But it didn’t eliminate all forms of broad relief in federal court, especially class actions and vacatur of federal rules. That’s where the energy has now shifted,” said Samuel Bray, a law professor at the University of Chicago whose work was cited in the high court’s June ruling.

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