In the Trump Era, the Supreme Court Can’t ‘Soar Above Politics’

Does John Roberts live in the same world as the rest of us? One has to wonder, given how frequently the Supreme Court’s chief justice seems removed from the social and political realities of the country.

As revealed by my Times colleagues Jodi Kantor and Adam Liptak in their remarkable, deeply reported article that was published on Sunday, Roberts orchestrated several high-profile rulings last term in ways that benefited Donald Trump, at least partly by acting as though the American people would not interpret them as political. In drafting the majority opinion for the Jan. 6 presidential immunity case, for example, Roberts “seemed confident that his arguments would soar above politics, persuade the public, and stand the test of time,” Kantor and Liptak wrote.

That attitude was dangerously naïve, as Justice Sonia Sotomayor tried to warn Roberts in the justices’ private conference following oral arguments in the case. The court was weighing whether to reverse a federal appeals court ruling that Trump was not immune from prosecution for his actions on and around Jan. 6. Sotomayor “did not see how the court could reverse the appellate decision. It would look like the Supreme Court was being used to delay the trial, she said,” according to the article.

She was right, of course: “Both conservatives and liberals saw it as an epic win for Mr. Trump.” Combined with the rulings in Trump’s favor in the other two Jan. 6 cases, it is no surprise that the Supreme Court’s public approval level is hovering around its all-time low. You don’t need a law degree to understand that in the post-Bush v. Gore era, the court treads on extremely thin ice when it inserts itself into presidential politics, all the more so if the justices in the majority share a political ideology with the winning side.