U.S. Supreme Court: Post-Ginsburg Edition

nominate two justices for every one that retires IMO

lol what’s the line on Sinema torpedoing the nom? (who will almost certainly be just to the right of Garland)

Joe Manchin's Unemployed Nephew nominated to the bench

lol what’s the line on Sinema torpedoing the nom? (who will almost certainly be just to the right of Garland)

― concentrating on Rationality (the book) (will), Tuesday, January 18, 2022 6:41 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

This would still surprise me -- she hasn't tanked Biden's other judicial nominees right? That's usually one of the few things the "moderates" will reliably vote with the party on.

I was initially being a little facetious, but honestly nothing surprises me at this point. She does seem to wait for big ticket items to go full villain mode though. Hoping something really bad happens to her tbh!

nominate two justices for every one that retires IMO

do it like that west wing episode

you prefer that one? wouldn't the other one be better?

Only Justice Clarence Thomas said publicly that he would have granted former President Donald Trump's request to block the document handover from the National Archives to the House select committee. No other justices made an objection public.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/supreme-court-trump-january-6/2022/01/19/a432dab4-797d-11ec-83e1-eaef0fe4b8c9_story.html

in oral arguments the other day Justice Gorsuch referred to "the so-called separation" of church and state

Heh, I would've probably said the same thing, though in a different context.

JFC, talking about originalism, wtf else could the establishment clause mean BUT a separation of church and state?

"There is no such thing as originalism" otm. It's all pretext.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OOWO--z1S8A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uff0h-zHuao

NEW: Supreme Court deals fresh rebuff to abortion providers, refuses to order Texas case sent back to trial judge who once blocked law. Three liberal justices dissent. https://t.co/zHvuJiycZ6

— Greg Stohr (@GregStohr) January 20, 2022

January 21st, 1975: SCOTUS rules it unconstitutional for states to deny women the right to serve on juries

Wow, didn't realize it was that late

I'm always shocked when I encounter stuff like that, bullshit that lasted so much longer than I realized. Like, for example, how many prominent colleges did not accept women until the 1970s.

Mississippi ratified the Thirteenth Amendment in fucking 2013.

A little light reading for the weekend.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/01/31/is-ginni-thomas-a-threat-to-the-supreme-court

It's a very long and infuriating piece that will surprise no one, but it is damning and you should read it.

I got about 1/3 of the way in and I’d had enough. So goddamn corrupt.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/stephen-breyer-retiring-supreme-court_n_6063b889c5b6d34efbc6616f

Which Manchin relative should replace him?

this guy

Kamala Harris is only a year older than Brett Kavanaugh. She'd be on the court twenty years and no longer be a headache for Biden while being a reliably pro-business, pro-leftwing social policy vote.

— Erick Erickson (@EWErickson) January 26, 2022

lol two seconds later they have Hillary replacing Kamala as Veep and Biden resigning

Nauseating even thinking about the delay tactics that are in store.

do they really need to? they've already got 6.

I dunno, think about it, why is 6 afraid of 7? Because 7 8 9.

"reliably pro-business, pro-leftwing social policy vote." I just threw up in my mouth.

I feel...optimistic?

As to his replacement: If all Democrats hang together – which I expect they will – they have the power to replace Justice Breyer in 2022 without one Republican vote in support.

— Lindsey Graham (@LindseyGrahamSC) January 26, 2022

That said, I did stop to check if there were any Democratic senators in states with Republican governors where state laws allow the governor to fill a senatorial vacancy on a non-interim basis (i.e., no special election) and with no requirement to appoint someone of the same party as the vacating senator.

There are three: Sherrod Brown (OH), Maggie Hassan (NH), and Jeanne Shaheen (NH), all of whom are under 75 years old and, as far as I know, in good health.

Campos a week later:

(1) I was told last week by somebody in the know that this was likely to happen. Today this same person tells me that an important component of Breyer’s decision and its timing is the nonsense that’s gone down at the SCOTUS in the last few weeks, specifically the handling of the Texas abortion litigation, and the mask kerfuffle. (Good job Neil Gorsuch!).

(2) The big question of course is whether the GOP’s evil but not-insane wing, led by Master of the Dark Arts Mitch McConnell, will take this as an opportunity to score cheap bipartisan comity points with the ever-clueless “liberal” establishment, by going along with the inevitable.

The answer to this question, of course, turns largely on whether the inevitable continues to look truly inevitable. Will there be the conservative equivalent of your typical “as a liberal Democratic law lady I vouch for Justice Kavanaugh’s brilliance and car pooling skills?” Again, there will be some of that iff the nomination looks like a fait accompli.

This in turn brings us to

(3) I’m putting the odds of a fake scandal, and probably a fake sex harassment scandal, erupting over the nominee as “much higher than all but the most cynical observers think.” For example I see some cult zealot or three claiming that the nominee made him/them “uncomfortable” in some amorphous way, by [insert bizarre and totally unverifiable or refutable set of accusations here]. Listen to me now and believe me later is what I’m saying. Everything with these people is payback, plus a lot of them are genuinely crazy.

(4) Of course none of this matters if every Democrat senator makes it absolutely clear at all times that they are voting for the nominee. If that happens, all the bullshit from the Scream Machine — and there will be a lot, starting with “whispers” about how this woman of color just isn’t very smart, because you know how affirmative action works — won’t be able to get traction. But if there’s anything less than a consistent united front (looking at you, Krysten), look out.

Nominate four, seat four and when a lawsuit challenging the legality occurs, bring it all the way to the 6-6 court

Nice thought. Chances are all of the new liberal judges would recuse themselves.

Certiorari "before judgment" is supposed to be an exceptionally rare practice through which #SCOTUS bypasses courts of appeals to expedite full review of merits cases. From Aug. 2004–Jan. 2018, #SCOTUS granted *0* such petitions. Today’s grant in the UNC case is the *15th* since.

— Steve Vladeck (@steve_vladeck) January 24, 2022

Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett 3 days after RBG died! and she was confirmed 27 days later. Biden today just promised to nominate someone by the end of February, a month from now

I know the timelines for the two nominations are different, but it would be nice to see some fire around this from the White House

I expect they're figuring out a strategy to blunt the intense negative media campaign against any black woman they nominate. They're probably busy testing the water with Democratic senators since they notoriously can't afford to lose even one. Maybe approaching a couple of Republican senators, too, in case they can bust one loose from Mitch's grip. Nothing comes easy these days.

https://img.buzzfeed.com/buzzfeed-static/static/2022-01/27/20/asset/0993aa7da167/sub-buzz-651-1643315598-12.jpg?downsize=700%3A%2A&output-quality=auto&output-format=auto
Boop.

there was an intense negative media campaign over Amy Coney Barrett and they just did it. and nobody is talking about it anymore

there was an intense negative media campaign over Amy Coney Barrett and they just did it.

There was never the slightest doubt the Republicans had enough votes to confirm her from the instant RBG died. They had enough of a cushion the outcome was ordained. (see what I did there) The Dems have to keep weird-ass Sinema on board, among others, and every Dem senator knows their leverage is nearly infinite.

Truly shocking - the Court tonight, 5-4 and without explanation, reinstates an execution that a district court and a unanimous court of appeals concluded should not proceed https://t.co/BnFpfmiAzI

— Kate Shaw (@kateashaw1) January 28, 2022

Not truly shocking with this court Law Professor Shaw.

The shocking thing I suppose is that Barrett sided with the liberals.

....but didn't join Kagan as a concurrence.

I suppose being in the majority of a 6-3 court means you can make a game out of taking turns having the others provide cover for you.

Saw somewhere the thought that she may have been spooked at the prospect of actually OKing the execution of someone the state went out of their way to pursue.

BREAKING: By a 5–4 vote, with Roberts joining the liberals in dissent, the Supreme Court halts a lower court order that required Alabama to redraw its congressional map, which diluted Black votes in violation of the Voting Rights Act.

— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC) February 7, 2022

i see our future has arrived and it has a big dollop of Jim Crow on it

just want to check back on this article and see how well it has aged

https://www.aei.org/articles/justice-john-roberts-was-right-things-have-changed-in-the-south/

Here's a horror story we should read on Halloween:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/02/14/amy-coney-barretts-long-game