To forestall any chance of rulings liberals may not like, President Joe Biden will propose new rules to put his stamp on the Supreme Court.
Term limits and an ethics code that could be enforced by an outside agency are in the package, according to The Washington Post, which cited sources it did not name.
Biden is also considering a constitutional amendment to strike down broad immunity for presidents.
Biden attacked the court’s rulings after it said presidents have broad immunity for official acts, a ruling that impacts the federal cases against former President Donald Trump.
“This decision today has continued the court’s attack in recent years on a wide range of long-established legal principles in our nation, from gutting voting rights and civil rights to taking away a woman’s right to choose, to today’s decision that undermines the rule of law of this nation,” Biden said then.
Biden told the Congressional Progressive Caucus about his plans in a Zoom call on Saturday.
“I’m going to need your help on the Supreme Court, because I’m about to come out — I don’t want to prematurely announce it — but I’m about to come out with a major initiative on limiting the court. … I’ve been working with constitutional scholars for the last three months, and I need some help,” Biden said.
Trump reacted angrily to the report.
“The Radical Left Democrats are desperately trying to ‘Play the Ref’ by calling for an illegal and unConstitutional attack on our SACRED United States Supreme Court,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
Can lifetime SCOTUS appointments be changed without amending the Constitution?
“The reason that these Communists are so despondent is that their unLawful Witch Hunts are failing everywhere. The Democrats are attempting to interfere in the Presidential Election, and destroy our Justice System, by attacking their Political Opponent, ME, and our Honorable Supreme Court,” Trump wrote.
“We have to fight for our Fair and Independent Courts, and protect our Country. MAGA2024!” trump wrote.
NBC analyst Chuck Todd gave the concept a negative review, according to Fox News.
“Look at the desperation in the air for Joe Biden right now,” Todd said.
“All of a sudden, out of nowhere, he’s trying to do a Supreme Court reform for another way of playing to the left, because right now his biggest supporters are progressives. Because those that are in swing districts, they want him off [the ticket],” he said.
MSNBC legal analyst Jordan Rubin wrote that even if what Biden wants were to pass Congress, which he noted has one house controlled by Republicans, the court Biden wants to overhaul in a liberal image could reject his plan as unconstitutional.
As noted by the U.K.’s Guardian, the legislation would need 60 votes to clear the Senate, far more than the current Democratic majority.
The Post noted that Democratic senators have introduced a bill that would cap a justice’s term at 18 years and appoint a new justice every two years, amid a reorganization on the court of what the current justices do until they go away.
The Post noted that Biden has been working with Harvard Law School professor Lawrence Tribe.
Tribe said with its conservative majority the court had “reached the point of assuming ultimate power over our entire legal and political system,” according to the Guardian.
Conservative justices are “essentially destroying the framework of checks and balances” that had endured “over the course of our history,” he said.
