Hi, I'm Dahlia Lithwick, and this is a special edition of Amicus, Slate's podcast about the courts and the law and the U.S. Supreme Court.

We are bringing you this extra episode with news of the first real clash between Donald Trump's Doge agenda and the highest court in the land on Wednesday morning in a brief order.

The Supreme Court rejected an emergency application from the Trump administration to junk a lower court order,

forcing the State Department to immediately pay out $2 billion owed to contractors for foreign aid work they had already completed.

The decision was, slightly alarmingly, five to four with Chief Justice John Roberts and Amy Coney-Barrant joining the court's liberal wing to side with the two challengers to the sudden freeze

of foreign aid spending. Joining me to chew over both the brief order and the hail fellow

well-met greeting between Donald Trump and, quote, his chief justice at Tuesday night's

joint session of Congress is Slate's very own Mark

Joseph Stern. Hi, Mark. Hi, Dahlia. I'm just going to note, I'm in a hotel room in Arizona,

and there's a baby screaming in the room next door. I would ordinarily not flag this,

except if you hear that sound,

that's actually all of us. I think she speaks for us all.

Especially Sam Alito today, who's never whined more like a baby than in this descent.

That baby is channeling Sam Alito. Before we get to this, I think, very consequential first loss for Donald Trump,

I think we need to start with the audio of Donald Trump after his remarks, personally thanking

the Chief Justice on Tuesday evening. Thank you again.

Thank you again.

Won't forget.

And that's the sound of President Trump patting the Chief Justice on his shoulder, thanking him and assuring him he will not forget.

So, Mark, we have this awkward moment.

It's horrifying. I think Elena Kagan's face, much like the baby in the hotel room next door, speaks for us all.

They waited to release this blockbuster order until after Donald Trump gave his speech.

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