Donald Trump's officials accused of defying one in three judges who ruled against him
Plaintiffs say Justice Department lawyers and the agencies they represent are snubbing rulings, providing false information, failing to turn over evidence, quietly working around court orders and inventing pretexts to carry out actions that have been blocked.
Judges appointed by presidents of both parties have often agreed.
None has taken punitive action to try to force compliance, however, allowing the administration's defiance of orders to go on for weeks or even months in some instances.
Outside legal analysts say courts typically are slow to begin contempt proceedings for non-compliance, especially while their rulings are under appeal.
Judges also are likely to be concerned, analysts say, that the US Marshals Service – whose director is appointed by the president – might not serve subpoenas or take recalcitrant government officials into custody if ordered to by the courts.
The allegations against the administration are crystallised in a whistleblower complaint filed to Congress late last month that accused justice officials of ignoring court orders in immigration cases, presenting legal arguments with no basis in the law and misrepresenting facts.
Supreme Court justice Sonia Sotomayor also chided the administration, writing that Trump officials had 'openly flouted' a judge's order not to deport migrants to a country where they did not have citizenship.
The Washington Post examined 337 lawsuits filed against the administration since Mr Trump returned to the White House and began a rapid-fire effort to reshape government programmes and policy.
As of mid-July, courts had ruled against the administration in 165 of those lawsuits.
The Washington Post found that the administration is accused of defying or frustrating court oversight in 57 of those cases – almost 35pc.
Legal experts said the pattern of conduct is unprecedented for any presidential administration and threatens to undermine the judiciary's role as a check on an executive branch asserting vast powers that test the boundaries of the law and constitution.
Immigration cases have emerged as the biggest flash point, but the administration has also been repeatedly accused of failing to comply in lawsuits involving cuts to federal funding and the workforce.
Trump officials deny defying court orders, even as they accuse those who have issued them of 'judicial tyranny'.
When the Supreme Court in June restricted the circumstances under which presidential policies could be halted nationwide while they are challenged in court, Mr Trump hailed the ruling as halting what he called a 'colossal abuse of power'.
'We've seen a handful of radical left judges try to overrule the rightful powers of the president,' Mr Trump said, falsely portraying the judges who have ruled against him as being solely Democrats.
Retired federal judge and former Watergate special prosecutor Paul Michel compared the situation to the summer of 1974, when the Supreme Court ordered then president Richard Nixon to turn over Oval Office recordings as part of the Watergate investigation.
Mr Nixon initially refused, prompting fears of a constitutional crisis, but ultimately complied.
'The current challenge is even bigger and more complicated because it involves hundreds of actions, not one subpoena for a set of tapes,' Mr Michel said. 'We're in new territory.'
Questions about whether the administration is defying judges have bubbled since early in Mr Trump's second term, when the Supreme Court said he must allow billions of dollars in already allocated foreign aid to flow.
Two months after a federal court had temporarily blocked Mr Trump's freeze on the congressionally approved foreign aid, an attorney for relief organisations said that the government had taken 'literally zero steps to allocate this money'.
Judge Amir Ali, a Joe Biden appointee, has ordered the administration to explain what it is doing to comply with the order. (© Washington Post)
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