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These Supreme Court justices want you to just shut up already [1]
['Daily Kos Staff']
Date: 2025-09-05
Americans are not super fond of the Supreme Court right now, with approval ratings hovering near their lowest ever.
Never fear, though. The conservative justices are here to set things right, and they know what it takes: a name change, a political adviser, and Bari Weiss.
First up, Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Kav would like people to stop referring to the court’s emergency docket as the “shadow docket” and call it the “interim docket” instead. Um, why? Because not everything that the court decides on that docket is an emergency.
Kavanaugh is not fooling anyone here. This isn’t about wanting some precision in terms of emergency versus non-emergency docket actions. He’s just mad that people keep rightly criticizing the conservatives on the court for deciding things in the literal shadows—hence, the shadow docket nickname.
Kav and his colleagues have issued devastating rulings, with no briefing from the parties, no oral arguments, and no explanation for their decisions.
Why can the denizens of DOGE get your Social Security data? The court won’t tell you, but they can!
Why can President Donald Trump fire commissioners without cause, even though there is a 90-year-old Supreme Court case saying otherwise? The court won’t tell you, but he can!
Despite the fact that the court’s conservatives have been nothing but handmaidens to fascism of late, giving Trump whatever he wants, Chief Justice John Roberts is busy lying to himself and everyone else by saying he doesn’t want the court to enter the political fray.
Related | Supreme Court couldn’t let the week go by without some treats for Trump
Of course, you didn’t hear that from Roberts himself. No, that’s a statement from his political adviser, which is a thing that apparently Supreme Court justices have now?
Roberts has a federal judge, Robert Dow, who serves as “counselor” to the chief justice. It looks like it is supposed to be more of a chief of staff role, but nonetheless, Dow has thoughts on behalf of Roberts, who he says doesn’t want to be pulled into any political conflicts.
President Donald Trump gestures to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts after being sworn in as president on Jan. 20, 2025.
Per Dow, the courts have “a very tiny megaphone and if we use our megaphone too often, we risk losing what I would say is the long game, and the long game is to preserve our independence.”
Brah. That independence ship sailed long ago, even before your boss invented a sweet, sweeping immunity for Trump. And while the lower courts have shown integrity and independence, your boss offers nothing but vague statements about how threatening judges is bad, mmmkay.
Meanwhile, the court routinely overturns the lower courts with no explanation, sending a consistent message to Trump that whenever he races there, he’ll get what he wants. You’re not above the political fray, pal. You’re doing politics, pure and simple.
None of this phases Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who is busy on her book tour, with stops at conservative-friendly locations like the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Barrett’s previous employer, Notre Dame.
Last Thursday, Barrett did a softball interview with right-wing media grifter Bari Weiss, proprietor of the Free Press, founder of a pretend “university” in Texas, and possibly the new head of CBS News. Barrett, you will probably not be surprised to learn, doesn’t see anything wrong with, well, anything right now.
“I think the Constitution is alive and well. I don't know what a constitutional crisis would look like,” she said. “I don't think that we are currently in a constitutional crisis, however. I think our country remains committed to the rule of law. I think we have functioning courts.”
To be fair, she’s right about one thing, which is that she really doesn’t know what a constitutional crisis looks like, because we’re deep into one. She also has no idea what a functioning court system looks like. The Supreme Court mostly exists these days to give Trump treats, constantly undermining the lower federal courts.
At root, none of these justices are seriously concerned about the Supreme Court. They’re unhappy about optics, but they’re not unhappy about their role in ushering in Trump’s king era. They just don’t think you should be nattering on about it so much.
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