In a Sunday speech at the McConnell Center at the University of Louisville, named for Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), only weeks after conservatives gutted abortion rights in Texas, Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett decried the view that the highest court in the land is politicized.
“My goal today is to convince you that this court is not comprised of a bunch of partisan hacks,” Barrett said, per the Louisville Courier Journal, at a celebration of the McConnell Center’s 30th anniversary. “The media, along with hot takes on Twitter, report the results and decisions…. That makes the decision seem results-oriented. It leaves the reader to judge whether the court was right or wrong, based on whether she liked the results of the decision.”
When asked about the “shadow docket,” under which the Supreme Court has issued decisions under a relative veil of secrecy, and the abortion decision that political experts say could be a harbinger of the overturning of Roe v. Wade, Barrett said it would be “inappropriate” to comment on the Supreme Court’s decision regarding the Texas law, as other similar cases may soon be coming before the court.
Early this month, the Supreme Court refused to block a Texas law that effectively overturns Roe v. Wade in the state and has had a chilling effect on virtually all abortions in the state. The decision, handed down by conservative justices in the court, was widely panned as dangerous and cruel.
The speech decrying the public view of the court as being politicized is ironic considering that Barrett’s nomination and confirmation were themselves highly politicized events, and the Republicans behind the whole process are arguably the very people responsible for creating that impression among the public. Additionally, it is not lost on the public that the justices nominated by Trump and the GOP explicitly for their ideological bent have largely lived up to that expectation.
Just weeks after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in September of last year and one week before the 2020 presidential election, the majority-Republican Senate confirmed Barrett to the highest court in the land along a 52-48 near-party line vote.
Democrats at the time pointed out the politicization of the process that was an important step for eroding public trust in the court. The Supreme Court typically enjoys majority support from the public, but according to a July poll, that support has dipped to under 50 percent.
The extremely short timeline for Barrett’s confirmation is underscored by the fact that Republicans, led by McConnell, had waged a historic campaign to block as many of President Barack Obama’s judicial appointments as possible.
The most infamous case was Obama’s appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court in March of 2016. McConnell blocked the appointment, arguing that the nomination was too close to the election in November, nearly seven months away.
In reality, McConnell was trying to pack the Supreme Court and the lower courts of the land. When Donald Trump took office months later, Republicans rushed the confirmation of conservative justice Neil Gorsuch, ushering in a new era of conservatism on the Supreme Court. Trump then went on to appoint nearly as many federal appeals court judges in four years as Obama did over his eight years in office.
Barrett’s speech is also ironic considering her extreme far-right stances that, according to some legal experts, position her as the most right-wing justice on the court. Fueled by conservative dark money interests, Barrett refused to acknowledge whether voter suppression was illegal during her confirmation hearing and had previously signed a statement calling Roe “barbaric.”
“Not ‘partisan hacks’? Then explain 80-0 partisan 5-4 record for big donors,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Oregon) wrote on Twitter, referencing the 80 cases backed by moneyed conservative interests that were decided by the five conservative justices in the court, with all liberal justices dissenting.
“[E]xplain judicially conservative principles rolled over to get those wins for donors who put you on the Court,” Whitehouse said. Referring to the so-called “shadow docket” decisions, he continued, “Explain why the Citizens United majority never enforced its supposed ‘transparency’ principle, for starters.”
We’re not backing down in the face of Trump’s threats.
As Donald Trump is inaugurated a second time, independent media organizations are faced with urgent mandates: Tell the truth more loudly than ever before. Do that work even as our standard modes of distribution (such as social media platforms) are being manipulated and curtailed by forces of fascist repression and ruthless capitalism. Do that work even as journalism and journalists face targeted attacks, including from the government itself. And do that work in community, never forgetting that we’re not shouting into a faceless void – we’re reaching out to real people amid a life-threatening political climate.
Our task is formidable, and it requires us to ground ourselves in our principles, remind ourselves of our utility, dig in and commit.
As a dizzying number of corporate news organizations – either through need or greed – rush to implement new ways to further monetize their content, and others acquiesce to Trump’s wishes, now is a time for movement media-makers to double down on community-first models.
At Truthout, we are reaffirming our commitments on this front: We won’t run ads or have a paywall because we believe that everyone should have access to information, and that access should exist without barriers and free of distractions from craven corporate interests. We recognize the implications for democracy when information-seekers click a link only to find the article trapped behind a paywall or buried on a page with dozens of invasive ads. The laws of capitalism dictate an unending increase in monetization, and much of the media simply follows those laws. Truthout and many of our peers are dedicating ourselves to following other paths – a commitment which feels vital in a moment when corporations are evermore overtly embedded in government.
Over 80 percent of Truthout‘s funding comes from small individual donations from our community of readers, and the remaining 20 percent comes from a handful of social justice-oriented foundations. Over a third of our total budget is supported by recurring monthly donors, many of whom give because they want to help us keep Truthout barrier-free for everyone.
You can help by giving today. Whether you can make a small monthly donation or a larger gift, Truthout only works with your support.