Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. I'm June Grosso. Every
Speaker 1: day we bring you insight an analysis into the most
Speaker 1: important legal news of the day. You can find more
Speaker 1: episodes at the Bloomberg Law Podcast, on Apple podcast, SoundCloud,
Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcasts. Chief Justice John
Speaker 1: Roberts famously compared justices to umpires at his confirmation hearing.
Speaker 1: Judges and justices are servants of the law, not the
Speaker 1: other way around. Judges are like umpires. Umpires don't make
Speaker 1: the rules, they apply them. The role of an umpire
Speaker 1: and a judge is critical. They make sure everybody plays
Speaker 1: by the rules, but it is a limited role. Now
Speaker 1: Roberts finds himself in the position of making sure that
Speaker 1: everyone plays by the rules at the impeachment trial of
Speaker 1: President Donald Trump, which he'll preside over, pulling the Chief
Speaker 1: into the same role that the late Chief Justice William
Speaker 1: Rehnquist played at the ile of President Bill Clinton, but
Speaker 1: at a far more partisan time in our history. Joining
Speaker 1: me is Bloomberg New Supreme Court reporter Greg Store. You
Speaker 1: spoke to Chief Justice Roberts when he was a mere
Speaker 1: lawyer before ran Quist oversaw the impeachment of President Clinton. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was back when I got to call him John.
Speaker 1: He was a very successful private lawyer, and I just
Speaker 1: asked him because he's a former law clerk to William Rehnquist,
Speaker 1: and we hadn't had an impeachment so long, so I
Speaker 1: asked him, how do you think that Chief Justice Renklist
Speaker 1: is going to be able to handle things? And he
Speaker 1: basically said, if anybody can do what, he can do it.
Speaker 1: Chief Justice Rehnquist had written a book on impeachment, so
Speaker 1: he knew as much about the process as anybody else,
Speaker 1: and he managed to juggle his dual duties. He was
Speaker 1: at the Supreme Court in the morning handling arguments and
Speaker 1: in the Senate in the afternoon dealing with the impeachment trout.
Speaker 1: And that's probably what John Roberts will have to do
Speaker 1: as well. As we've discussed many times, John Roberts repeatedly
Speaker 1: when he's at lecture or Q and as talks about
Speaker 1: how the judiciary is above partisan politics, and now he's
Speaker 1: going to be thrust in the center of the most
Speaker 1: partisan trial of our time. Perhaps how will he manage that?
Speaker 1: It's certainly something he has prided himself on, both himself
Speaker 1: and the Supreme Court not being, as he said, part
Speaker 1: of politics. It could be a challenge for him. It
Speaker 1: really depends a lot on how much he's asked to do.
Speaker 1: Back in the Clinton impeachment trial, the two sides agreed
Speaker 1: on the basic ground rules, and what they didn't agree
Speaker 1: on going in, they agreed to as they went along,
Speaker 1: and that meant that William Rinqust really didn't have to
Speaker 1: decide all that much. That could end up being the
Speaker 1: same thing with John Roberts. But it could also be
Speaker 1: the case that he's being asked to deal with a
Speaker 1: lot of questions. And while it's always the case that
Speaker 1: the Senate can override anything he decides, he's not the
Speaker 1: final word. Um, it may be that he feels a
Speaker 1: need to make a show of being even handed and
Speaker 1: making sure there's a certain amount of fairness to the proceeding.
Speaker 1: I just wonder about his image. As you mentioned in
Speaker 1: your story, this is the first time that most people
Speaker 1: will have heard the Chief Justice since his confirmation hearings,
Speaker 1: and they're going to see him in this very political environment,
Speaker 1: and I just wonder what that does to his image. Well,
Speaker 1: it could go either way. It could drag him down
Speaker 1: into it or it could be in the moment where
Speaker 1: he rises above it. You know, undoubtedly all the members
Speaker 1: of Congress who are going to be before him are
Speaker 1: going to be acting in a very political manner. He
Speaker 1: may appear to be the one person in the room
Speaker 1: who's not thinking about politics. In that sense, one could
Speaker 1: imagine it could enhance his image. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: if he gets forced into making decisions, if he makes
Speaker 1: controversial decisions, there is some danger that he will be
Speaker 1: seen as taking sides. Chief Justice Rehnquist had a relatively
Speaker 1: light docket when he presided over the Clinton impeachment trial.
Speaker 1: What kind of docket is if Justice Robert's facing, It's
Speaker 1: relatively light in January when the trial is probably going
Speaker 1: to take place. So, for example, on the on the
Speaker 1: Wednesdays when the Court is hearing argument that week, it's
Speaker 1: only hearing one each day, So it would be easy
Speaker 1: enough for him to hear arguments in that case in
Speaker 1: the morning and go over to the Senate in the afternoon.
Speaker 1: The term as a whole, of course, is a lot
Speaker 1: bigger than that, and we've discussed some of those big cases.
Speaker 1: A gun case, they've got an abortion case, they've got
Speaker 1: sectional orientation, and transgender job discrimination. And now they have
Speaker 1: the Trump subpoena cases where members of Congress and the
Speaker 1: New York Grand Jury are trying to get Donald Trump's
Speaker 1: financial documents. So the big picture is that John Roberts
Speaker 1: has an awful lot of big stuff to deal with,
Speaker 1: But it may not be the case in January that
Speaker 1: he's got that much on his plate. So we know
Speaker 1: one thing for sure, and that is that he will
Speaker 1: not be wearing the robes that Chief Justice Rehnquist war,
Speaker 1: which had gold braiding on them like Gilbert and Sullivan,
Speaker 1: but Chief Justice in quists other than that took sort
Speaker 1: of a backseat role as a presiding judge is chief
Speaker 1: just as Roberts likely do the same. Well. Yeah, so
Speaker 1: the one thing everybody remembers from the Clinton and Peachman
Speaker 1: trial about William Renklist is that he had the four
Speaker 1: gold stripes on his sleeves. Those were inspired by the
Speaker 1: Gilbert and Sullivan operetta Iolanthey. After that trial, Renclist used
Speaker 1: a quote from that operetta to describe what he did.
Speaker 1: He said, I did nothing in particular, and I did
Speaker 1: it very well. I'm sure John Roberts would love for
Speaker 1: that to be the case for him now, he is
Speaker 1: probably not looking forward to this. It puts him out
Speaker 1: of his element. He's going to have to be dealing
Speaker 1: with stuff that he's not at all accustomed dealing with
Speaker 1: Senate rules, having to make decisions on the spot. It
Speaker 1: may be that, especially if the Senators end up with
Speaker 1: a bare bones kind of trial, or he doesn't have
Speaker 1: to do a whole lot, he can come out much
Speaker 1: like William Renklist didn't say he didn't have to do
Speaker 1: a whole lot, but we'll just have to see. And
Speaker 1: he has presided over a so called hot bench at
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court, but he's never presided over a trial.
Speaker 1: He has not. You're right on you, so to my
Speaker 1: yours is the only one of the nine Supreme Court
Speaker 1: justices who's been a trial judge. So yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: trial judges, unlike Capella judges, do make decisions on the spot.
Speaker 1: They don't get to go back and sit in their
Speaker 1: conference room and discuss with their colleagues how they're going
Speaker 1: to come out and then rule several months later. It'll
Speaker 1: be a new experience for John Roberts. Absolutely, he will
Speaker 1: have the ability to consult with the Senate Parliamentarian that
Speaker 1: and doubtedly will be an important source of support for him.
Speaker 1: He'll have at least one aid from the Supreme Court,
Speaker 1: the man named Jeff mcneir, who will be coming over
Speaker 1: there with him. He can us his law clarks if
Speaker 1: he wants to, so he will have some assistance, but
Speaker 1: it will be a very new experience for him. Thanks Greg.
Speaker 1: That's Greg Store, Bloomberg new Supreme Court reporter. Thanks for
Speaker 1: listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and
Speaker 1: listen to the show on Apple podcast, SoundCloud and on
Speaker 1: Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brasso. This is
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