Reform the Supreme Court

For decades, the conservative Federalist Society has worked to help Republican presidents stack the US Supreme Court with a 6-3 majority of far-right partisan appointees. Since Trump’s first term, SCOTUS has issued a dramatic series of decisions advancing far right policy priorities, from eviscerating the Voting Rights Act and campaign finance reforms to undermining federal agencies’ ability to make and enforce safety and environmental regulations. SCOTUS has gutted abortion access while allowing discrimination against transgender people, racial profiling of immigrants, and criminalization of people who are unhoused. Further, the Court has also granted Donald Trump unprecedented power by extending presidential immunity to his official acts and allowing him to unilaterally fire heads of independent government agencies like the Federal Trade Commission. These decisions have flouted decades of established legal precedent and reflect the conservative justices’ commitment to scoring political points at the expense of our laws and Constitution.

Conservative justices’ blatant ethics violations, public support for January 6 insurrectionists, and use of the “shadow docket” to bypass judicial process further illustrate SCOTUS’ rampant corruption and politicization. As a “self-regulating” body that sets and applies its own rules, the Court currently avoids true ethics oversight.

SCOTUS’ damage to our justice system, the balance of power within our government, and democracy itself cannot continue. Our duly elected officials must reform how the Supreme Court operates.