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Aug. 11, 2024
Editor, The News-Gazette: The Supreme Court’s long-delayed Trump v. U.S. decision last month demonstrated how far the right-wing supermajority is willing to go to quash efforts to prosecute the former president for any crimes, past or future. Anything a president does that can be considered an “official act” is now off limits for prosecutors, although the justices did reserve for themselves the right to decide what’s “official”—Democratic presidents, take note.
President Biden has recently proposed some reforms for the Court: term limits for justices, an enforceable code of ethics, and a limit on presidential immunity via constitutional amendment. In response, Senate Minority Leader McConnell, in a Washington Post editorial, cried that the proposed changes would spell the “end of judicial independence.” Sorry, Mitch — that ship has already sailed.
We are 50 years past the time when a Court with four Nixon appointees handed down the unanimous decision that led to Nixon’s resignation. One Nixon appointee actually recused himself because of his friendship with some of the Watergate conspirators — how quaint! Today, Trump’s three appointees seem reluctant to rule against his interests, as do Justices Thomas and Alito, who have sat in on cases related to January 6, even though one is married to a person who vigorously advocated overturning the 2020 election and the other displayed flags in support of the insurrection at two of his residences.
We cannot turn back the clock to a time before obstructed confirmation hearings and strategic retirements and billionaires supplementing the justices’ salaries with expensive vacations in order to maintain influence over our “independent” judiciary. We should welcome President Biden’s efforts to move this important conversation forward. In the meantime, we should elect a prosecutor, not a convicted criminal, to be our next president, and give her a Senate that will not obstruct her judicial appointments. MARINA PRATT Buena Vista
