Speaker 1: Justice Clarence Thomas is no stranger to being maligned by
Speaker 1: the left. He faced one of the nastiest and most
Speaker 1: evil character assassinations during his confirmation hearing.
Speaker 2: He famously said this about it. Listen, I think that
Speaker 2: this today is a travel steer.
Speaker 3: I think that it is disgusting. I think that this
Speaker 3: hearing should never occur in America. I think something is
Speaker 3: dreadfully wrong with this country when any person, any person
Speaker 3: in this free country would be subjected to this.
Speaker 4: This is a circus.
Speaker 2: It's a national.
Speaker 3: Disgrace, and from my standpoint as of a black American,
Speaker 3: as far as I'm concerned, it is a high attack lynching.
Speaker 1: He is not once again on the receiving end of
Speaker 1: attacks from the left. This time they are questioning his
Speaker 1: financial disclosures. It also comes at a time when other
Speaker 1: conservative justice are under attack by the media as well.
Speaker 1: This is clearly an orchestrated, coordinated attack to delegitimize the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court. So who's behind this smear of conservative justices
Speaker 1: and what exactly are they trying to accomplish. Carrie Severino,
Speaker 1: president of JCN and the author of Justice on Trial, joins.
Speaker 2: Me to get to the BOTB of it.
Speaker 1: Stay tuned, Carrie, It's such an honor to have you
Speaker 1: on the show.
Speaker 2: I've worked in DC or did.
Speaker 1: I no longer work in DC, but did work in
Speaker 1: politics long enough to know a coordinated attack when I
Speaker 1: see one. We've seen hits recently on Justice Clarence Thomas
Speaker 1: Gorsuch Roberts.
Speaker 2: This is coordinated, is it not?
Speaker 5: I mean, I think it's pretty obvious. Again, if this
Speaker 5: has all the hallmarks of that. Suddenly, out of the
Speaker 5: blue we go from zero to sixty on people doing
Speaker 5: deep dives and going through with a fine tooth. Come
Speaker 5: the financial files of not every justice, but a select justices,
Speaker 5: and wouldn't you know it's all the conservative justices. And
Speaker 5: then there's this, you know, staged release of the opinions.
Speaker 5: And it's even interesting, you know, things like Justice Chief
Speaker 5: Justice Roberts is invited to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee,
Speaker 5: which in itself is very unusual.
Speaker 4: They want to try to question the Chief.
Speaker 5: Justice, and then as soon as he declines the next
Speaker 5: day there's a piece about his wife and suggesting that,
Speaker 5: you know that her job as a legal recruiter or
Speaker 5: somehow improper. So it's all of these things are just
Speaker 5: very clearly targeting the conservative justices in the court, and
Speaker 5: they're clearly I think, there to try to intimidate the
Speaker 5: justices saying, hey, if you don't follow the direction that
Speaker 5: we want, we finally don't have a court that is
Speaker 5: just doing the bidding of the left. Now we're going
Speaker 5: to come after you, and we're going to try these
Speaker 5: personal attacks to delegitimize those justices and or remove them
Speaker 5: from the court or from the cases.
Speaker 2: Why now do you think I think it's you.
Speaker 5: Know, coincidence that we're seeing this at the same time
Speaker 5: as we are seeing the first time in living memory
Speaker 5: that we have a court that has a majority of
Speaker 5: originalist justices. For again, all of living memory, we've had
Speaker 5: a court that has been effectively willing to give the
Speaker 5: left what it wants on some of the major issues
Speaker 5: that come before it. Issues in some cases there are
Speaker 5: the ones that should be decided in the political realm,
Speaker 5: but that they can't get done what they want to,
Speaker 5: and so then they are relying on the court to
Speaker 5: play back up and kind of get things over the
Speaker 5: finish line they couldn't get done legislatively and trying to
Speaker 5: open the doors for liberal policies to be enacted via
Speaker 5: the court. We have a court that's not playing that game.
Speaker 5: Their job is to look at the constitution and what
Speaker 5: the law says.
Speaker 4: They know it.
Speaker 5: And so as soon as you have a court that
Speaker 5: isn't playing by their game, they start attacking the court
Speaker 5: itself because they're so frustrated to see justices whose first
Speaker 5: duty is not to trying to achieve these liberal policy
Speaker 5: goals but relate to the constitution and the rule of law.
Speaker 1: Now, we've seen attacks on the Supreme Court before, you know,
Speaker 1: throughout history. Are these attacks different than what we've seen before.
Speaker 5: There have been examples in history where similar types of
Speaker 5: things have happened. I think we certainly have a focus
Speaker 5: on it more than other times. I'm thinking of, you know,
Speaker 5: the last big time we saw this that comes to
Speaker 5: mind might be when President Franklin Delan Roosevelt was really
Speaker 5: frustrated with the Court because he's enacting all of his
Speaker 5: you know, New Deal programs.
Speaker 4: The court was saying, hey, you know, we think some of.
Speaker 5: These have real constitutional problems, and he's going, how can
Speaker 5: I get rid of these justices?
Speaker 4: And that's when he proposed for.
Speaker 5: The first time, you know again that I can think
Speaker 5: of just a purely political thing saying let's pack the court,
Speaker 5: let's add justices, so that I, as the president, get
Speaker 5: to pick more of these justices to shift the direction
Speaker 5: the court is going. And even with a overwhelming majority
Speaker 5: and a huge mandate from the Democratic controlled Congress, he
Speaker 5: couldn't get that done because they said that's.
Speaker 4: Beyond the pale.
Speaker 5: So we're seeing attacks like that that failed so spectacularly
Speaker 5: in nineteen thirty seven being brought back now, but additional
Speaker 5: things as well, so that we're getting these personal attacks
Speaker 5: on the justices. I think we saw hints of this
Speaker 5: in Justice Thomas's confirmation in nineteen ninety, in the Justice
Speaker 5: Kavanaugh confirmation in twenty eighteen, So all of these are
Speaker 5: sort of just increasing in volume and increasing in focus,
Speaker 5: and we're seeing things that I don't know have ever
Speaker 5: happened in American history, like the dosing of the justices.
Speaker 5: Not just their homes, which is bad enough, but often
Speaker 5: they're places of worship, the places their children go to school,
Speaker 5: and that additional threat level, so it's not just an
Speaker 5: attack on them personally their reputation, but even physically. And
Speaker 5: we saw, of course an attempted assassination that we now
Speaker 5: know was and just targeting Justice Kavanaugh, but actually he
Speaker 5: was going to try to take out three justices that
Speaker 5: night if he was able to. So some of those
Speaker 5: things really are new. And to have the White House
Speaker 5: and Democratic members of the Senate really encouraging that type
Speaker 5: of behavior makes it takes it again to the next
Speaker 5: level into something that I don't know that we've ever
Speaker 5: seen before.
Speaker 2: To that point.
Speaker 1: I mean, you had Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer on
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court steps in March of twenty twenty about
Speaker 1: Justices Gorsage in Kavanaugh saying that they had released the whirlwind,
Speaker 1: that they would pay the price if they continue to
Speaker 1: make awful decisions. And you had Sheldon white House not
Speaker 1: too long ago also attacked the Supreme Court saying it
Speaker 1: is not well, the people know it, perhaps the Court
Speaker 1: can heal itself, or basically making the threat that they'll
Speaker 1: have to do something about it. So just overt verbal threats,
Speaker 1: even from our Democrat leaders.
Speaker 5: Absolutely, it's really outrageous to see that. And then you
Speaker 5: they have the guts to say, wow, there's something wrong,
Speaker 5: because for some reason, the American people believe there's an
Speaker 5: appearance of improprietary. They have record low levels of confidence.
Speaker 4: In the Supreme Court, and you're going, it's because you
Speaker 4: have been.
Speaker 5: And now we're moving into several years of a focused
Speaker 5: campaign trying to tell the American people that the Court
Speaker 5: is acting politically and is not behaving properly, which is
Speaker 5: just lies. So they're trying to find they're creating the
Speaker 5: problem itself of American people not trusting the Court really
Speaker 5: to provide the excuse that they would need to do
Speaker 5: things like pack the court, to do things like trying
Speaker 5: to you know, they're talks about trying to even add
Speaker 5: term limits on justices or create new ethical standards that
Speaker 5: really we know are just a form of them trying
Speaker 5: to bully the justices because any of these ethical concerns
Speaker 5: is not something that's being applied even handedly. They're basically
Speaker 5: inventing new ethic standards out of whole cloth, not people
Speaker 5: haven't run a foul of the actual ethic standards that
Speaker 5: are out there. They're inventing new standards, but they're only
Speaker 5: inventing them for a subset of the justices. So all
Speaker 5: of these things, they're really targeting the justices that they
Speaker 5: know we're going to get attacked in the media and
Speaker 5: get attacked by these same unscrupulous members of Congress.
Speaker 1: What are those duties look like for the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: justices to disclose finances?
Speaker 2: You know, what does that look like?
Speaker 1: And are any of these allegations that have been made
Speaker 1: against you know, Thomas or some of the other justices,
Speaker 1: do any of these run a foul to what their
Speaker 1: responsibility is?
Speaker 4: What we have seid, So justices do have.
Speaker 5: There's one fallacy that's out there that's again intentional misrepresentation,
Speaker 5: suggesting that while it's just the wild west of the
Speaker 5: Supreme Court, they can do whatever the heck they want,
Speaker 5: there's nothing that governs it. That's not true. They do
Speaker 5: have annual disclosures they have to file. They do have
Speaker 5: a recusal statutes that do govern them and that they follow,
Speaker 5: and that they consult each other in terms of determining, Okay,
Speaker 5: at what point should I recuse in this case type
Speaker 5: case or that type of case. So there absolutely are
Speaker 5: standards that the justices are following. Now are they followed
Speaker 5: perfectly every time?
Speaker 4: No? But what we're seeing here is nitpicking on errors.
Speaker 5: Just as if any one of us, if you had
Speaker 5: someone in fact not just someone, a team of someone's,
Speaker 5: a team of highly financed from media, from dark money
Speaker 5: groups in the left wing going through your tax returns,
Speaker 5: for example, and said with a fine tooth comb, I
Speaker 5: bet they could find a typo or two.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 5: Does that mean that you are somehow maliciously doing these things? No,
Speaker 5: it's just a complicated form. So what we've seen historically
Speaker 5: is absolutely there are justices who have forgotten to disclose
Speaker 5: things or incorrectly disclose things, but those justices.
Speaker 4: Actually do run the gamut.
Speaker 5: Justice Ginsberg, for example, sat on dozens of cases inadvertently
Speaker 5: in which her husband owned stock. Now, normally that would
Speaker 5: be just an easy given if you or your spouse
Speaker 5: owned stock and something you have to recuse. And I
Speaker 5: don't think at all that for a minute she was
Speaker 5: voting differently in those cases because her husband owned stock.
Speaker 4: I don't think she knew or she would have recused herself.
Speaker 5: But it's that type of thing that when it happens
Speaker 5: to a left wing justice or justice Jackson just neglected
Speaker 5: to disclose certain aspects of her income, her husband's medical
Speaker 5: malpractice work that she just forgotten then later amended her filings,
Speaker 5: and that's viewed as kind of like, oh, okay, they
Speaker 5: just amended this great, and I think that's right. This
Speaker 5: wasn't malicious, there wasn't real corruption. But those same levels
Speaker 5: of things on the right are being treated as if
Speaker 5: there is a corrupt mafia running the institution and that
Speaker 5: these justices are up for sale, which is patently false.
Speaker 5: And even when the Senate Judiciary Committee had a hearing
Speaker 5: last week talking about this, even the liberal witnesses on
Speaker 5: their side, after making all of these suggestions and kind
Speaker 5: of eyebrow raising and suggesting and inferring that these justices
Speaker 5: are up for sale, when they were directly asked, are
Speaker 5: you wait, who are you saying has sold their votes?
Speaker 4: Who are you saying is actually corrupt the guys? Oh
Speaker 4: I didn't. I know, I wouldn't.
Speaker 5: I wouldn't actually accuse them because that would be slanderous.
Speaker 4: I mean, that's not what's happening.
Speaker 5: It's people trying to exploit minor issues or things that
Speaker 5: they're saying, Hey, I wish the diskills the rules were different.
Speaker 5: You follow the rules, but I think you should disclose more. Okay,
Speaker 5: we can talk about that, but don't pretend that people
Speaker 5: who follow the rules now somehow we're doing something inappropriate
Speaker 5: when that's not true.
Speaker 1: Let's take a quick commercial break more with Carrie Savarino
Speaker 1: on the other side, If you look at Joe Biden,
Speaker 1: it seems like some of the most discrediting and some
Speaker 1: of the biggest attacks on Supreme Court nominees or the
Speaker 1: Supreme Court itself have come under his watch.
Speaker 2: I mean, you look at right now. He's part of
Speaker 2: the United States.
Speaker 1: He's at the helm of two of the nastiest Supreme
Speaker 1: Court confirmation hearings, whether it was Clarence Thomas or Robert Borke.
Speaker 2: So, I mean, how much does that have to do
Speaker 2: with it? Oh?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean Biden has been part of the ringleader
Speaker 5: of this crazy judicial intimidation circus from day one.
Speaker 4: I mean he was around during the Bork era. Eve.
Speaker 5: I mean this is like very early on in this process.
Speaker 5: He was leading the Judiciary Committee during the Thomas hearings.
Speaker 5: He he is definitely part of the problem, and we're
Speaker 5: seeing under his administration things like him going from saying
Speaker 5: court packing is a bonehead idea, which was correct, that's
Speaker 5: what he said in nineteen eighty two, to then saying, actually,
Speaker 5: maybe it's something we should consider it. Well, we should
Speaker 5: consider it when maybe it gives me extra people to
Speaker 5: put on the court.
Speaker 4: Right, It's a very clear shift there.
Speaker 5: You've seen him, you know, say one thing about Justice Thomas,
Speaker 5: don't worry. I realize these charges are you know, unfounded,
Speaker 5: and then going and helping lead the three wing circus
Speaker 5: against him during his confirmation hearings.
Speaker 4: He is willing to play multiple sides of it.
Speaker 5: You know, when Justice were being docksed again and people
Speaker 5: are making threats against them, you had his spokeswoman saying,
Speaker 5: you know, we wish really support people's First Amendment rights
Speaker 5: and we're proud of a maybe American right to protest.
Speaker 5: What is the message being sent when people are violating
Speaker 5: federal law by trying to intimidate the justices regarding an
Speaker 5: active case, because they were doing this intentionally to try
Speaker 5: to change the justice's vote on the Dobbs opinion last year.
Speaker 5: They basically said, we support this, we endorse this, and
Speaker 5: that's that is a huge message that's being sent by
Speaker 5: this administration. And I think the bottom line is he's
Speaker 5: willing to say and do whatever it is to get
Speaker 5: more power, including more power over the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you want to talk about ethics, Joe
Speaker 1: Biden has none. And you know, if there's any question
Speaker 1: that this isn't coordinated, you had mentioned the Senate Judiciaries
Speaker 1: Committee hearing called Supreme Court Ethics reform after these articles
Speaker 1: had surfaced, so you know it clearly is this coordinated attempt?
Speaker 1: You know, Carrie, from your perspective, obviously you follow this
Speaker 1: closer than anyone in the Supreme Court. Has this impacted
Speaker 1: any of the decision making these threats the you know,
Speaker 1: people outside of the justices' homes, or even assassination attempt
Speaker 1: Have you noticed has it been working, this attimidation?
Speaker 4: You know, I think it definitely. It clearly didn't.
Speaker 5: In the case of the Dobbs decision, right, we saw
Speaker 5: a decision that was leaked May second last year, and
Speaker 5: then came out in substantially the same form at the
Speaker 5: end of June June twenty fourth, and they I think
Speaker 5: they were consciously.
Speaker 4: Saying we are not going to bow to this pressure.
Speaker 5: Were there were some changes that were just not changes,
Speaker 5: additions addressing concerns brought up by the dissent, for example,
Speaker 5: that wasn't available at the time, but they basically said, no,
Speaker 5: we are not changing our position and I think that's
Speaker 5: what the Court has been doing.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 5: One thing that I wonder is is this slowing down
Speaker 5: their work. We've seen this court this term has been
Speaker 5: one of the slowest release of opinions. We have tons
Speaker 5: of opinions still to come out, and there's really just
Speaker 5: over a month left. And maybe some of the extra
Speaker 5: security protocols and the extra difficulty of knowing who they
Speaker 5: can trust, even internally, maybe I think that could be
Speaker 5: slowing down the ability to work. I think there has
Speaker 5: to be trust rebuilt within the court elf amongst each other,
Speaker 5: amongst the clerks and the staff, and I think that
Speaker 5: is a real shame and a tragedy. I worry that
Speaker 5: it could influence justices saying, hey, this is you know,
Speaker 5: there's a whole lot of really important issues that are
Speaker 5: always coming up. I hope they're not looking at cases
Speaker 5: going wow, that is an issue that in a vacuum,
Speaker 5: I would say the Court has to address, but we
Speaker 5: just don't need any more pressure this year. I hope
Speaker 5: that's not happening. But we know one hundred percent that
Speaker 5: is the goal of all of this. They know that,
Speaker 5: for example, these threats against Justice Thomas, like trying to
Speaker 5: get him to move. Come on, nobody can move Justice
Speaker 5: Thomas from what he knows is the right thing mandated
Speaker 5: the content by the Constitution. That man has a spine
Speaker 5: of steel. But I think they're trying to hope to
Speaker 5: influence the other justices and say, maybe we just want
Speaker 5: to stay a little farther back here.
Speaker 4: I don't think that has worked, but I want I
Speaker 4: think we need to be.
Speaker 5: Really out there ensuring that it doesn't have a chance
Speaker 5: to work, and that people shouldn't be keeping this kind
Speaker 5: of pressure up because no one, for the sake of
Speaker 5: doing their job and enforcing the Constitution should have to
Speaker 5: sacrifice their personal privacy and the safety of themselves and
Speaker 5: their family.
Speaker 1: Well, and you know, not many people have the kind
Speaker 1: of integrity Justice Clarence does, or can face the sort
Speaker 1: of character assassination that he faced, you know, even from
Speaker 1: the beginning during his confirmation hearings up until you know
Speaker 1: this point. Not that many people are that rock ribbed
Speaker 1: and just strong in their beliefs to be able to
Speaker 1: withstand that kind of slander.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 5: Absolutely, And I think it has so many layers to
Speaker 5: it because they love to make his life miserable. I
Speaker 5: I feel like that's bonus points for them, but it
Speaker 5: sends a message to other judges, justices. It sends a
Speaker 5: message to other judges who might one day think, Okay,
Speaker 5: I could theoretically be aligned for the Supreme Court.
Speaker 4: Do I want that position?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 5: Do I want to put my family and my own
Speaker 5: reputation in life through the ringer or that it's going
Speaker 5: to be to in order to do that. And again,
Speaker 5: that shouldn't be part of the calculus. We want our
Speaker 5: best men women on the bench to want this job
Speaker 5: and not to say, Okay, I'm going to take this
Speaker 5: knowing that I'm going to have to like sacrifice myself.
Speaker 4: On the altar of the Constitution. This isn't that.
Speaker 5: That shouldn't be the cost we are demanding, and we
Speaker 5: should be requiring our representatives, especially you think, gosh, these senators,
Speaker 5: these supposed to be representing American people. I know there
Speaker 5: are radicals out there who really do want the Court intimidated,
Speaker 5: but I don't think that's where most of America is.
Speaker 5: And I think that those people who are part of
Speaker 5: this process ought to be held to account, and the
Speaker 5: American people should stand up, just like it did in
Speaker 5: nineteen thirty seven. To say, you know what, Okay, politics
Speaker 5: is politics, and maybe I don't agree with some of
Speaker 5: the decisions the Court makes, but no one should be
Speaker 5: trying to undermine the institution of the Court the way
Speaker 5: that they are and trying to drag the good names
Speaker 5: of our justices through the mud.
Speaker 1: That's really the point in the direction all this is heading.
Speaker 1: As you pointed that, you know, good candidates might be like, hey,
Speaker 1: this isn't worth it. You know, I don't want to
Speaker 1: have to go through this. I mean, that's why they're
Speaker 1: doing this to Trump as well. Whey they've tried to
Speaker 1: destroy his life so that future Republican candidates are like,
Speaker 1: you know what, I just this isn't worth it. I
Speaker 1: don't want to drag my family through the mud. I
Speaker 1: don't drag myself through the mud. And you know, it's
Speaker 1: the intimidation fact that they're intentionally trying to do. I
Speaker 1: do worry that it'll it'll work in the future. I'm
Speaker 1: sure people have probably given pause to stick their knock
Speaker 1: out there in these various positions.
Speaker 5: This is not the way our American system of the
Speaker 5: rule of law should operate. The reason our Constitution gave
Speaker 5: justicees life tenure was so that they would be able
Speaker 5: to have an independent judgment, that they wouldn't have to
Speaker 5: rule on cases thinking, Okay, I want to make this
Speaker 5: person mad because I might need to ask them for
Speaker 5: a job later. I don't want to alienate this industry
Speaker 5: or this you know, this party because I'm going to
Speaker 5: be back in the loop again.
Speaker 4: Sometimes they said, you know, we want you off the table.
Speaker 4: You are just.
Speaker 5: Focusing on doing what's right as a matter of law.
Speaker 5: So our constitution realized, we want people to be independent
Speaker 5: thinker and not be prone to having to make people happy.
Speaker 4: Here's the challenge.
Speaker 5: They're still trying to use whatever lovers of power they can,
Speaker 5: and it's increasingly people are saying the quiet part out loud,
Speaker 5: and you've got people on the left tweeting about and
Speaker 5: writing about how yeah, the goal should be to try
Speaker 5: to make them worried, either for their safety or for
Speaker 5: their for their good name, we should our goal should
Speaker 5: be to cancel people and drum them out of polite society.
Speaker 5: They shouldn't be allowed to speak at a law school,
Speaker 5: go out to dinner, you know, you name it, because
Speaker 5: we want them to be punished for their positions. That
Speaker 5: is contrary to our constitution envisions that role of trying
Speaker 5: to have someone independent and I think the justice as
Speaker 5: we do have are going to, you know, still try
Speaker 5: to stay the course and stay firm, but we should
Speaker 5: not make that harder for them in the process. We
Speaker 5: want a our court to be free of that pressure.
Speaker 5: And just think about it, particularly respect to the threats
Speaker 5: to security. And now you have the senators who are
Speaker 5: again just they said, well, if if you're not going
Speaker 5: to adopt the ethics code that we want, maybe we'll
Speaker 5: just cut your funding. And oh, coincidentally, we're going to
Speaker 5: cut it the same amount of the funding that you're
Speaker 5: asking for security increases for the court.
Speaker 4: You know why they need the security increases because of
Speaker 4: this intimidation campaign.
Speaker 5: And so it's almost making this direct link of if
Speaker 5: you don't do what we want, we're going to put
Speaker 5: your security at risk. That is the kind of intimidation
Speaker 5: and you know, problems with separation of powers.
Speaker 4: I might expect somewhere like of Venezuela.
Speaker 5: I might expect that in Cuba, threats from you know,
Speaker 5: the administration or from the legislature to the court. If
Speaker 5: you don't know what we want, your safety is at risk.
Speaker 5: We might not be able to protect you. That's not
Speaker 5: what I would expect in the United States of America.
Speaker 5: We want our justices to be making their decisions based
Speaker 5: on what they know to be right according to the
Speaker 5: rule of law, their best estimate of that, their best understanding,
Speaker 5: and what the law requires, not based on I am
Speaker 5: concerned for what will happen to me personally if I
Speaker 5: rule one way or the other.
Speaker 1: Although we're very increasingly looking like a different country than
Speaker 1: or founding fathers had envisioned, and unfortunately looking you know,
Speaker 1: closer to Venezuela or China or some of these other
Speaker 1: authoritarian nations in a variety of ways. You'd mentioned some
Speaker 1: of the intimidation. I mean, we saw senators face this
Speaker 1: as well during the Kavanaugh confirmation hearing. I mean, I
Speaker 1: know that I got incredibly fired up during that because
Speaker 1: not only is it wrong to smear an innocent man,
Speaker 1: which he clearly was, and it was very clear that
Speaker 1: Christine Ford was lying, but you know, we had senators
Speaker 1: face death threats, have to have security during that time
Speaker 1: period as well, I mean, they their lives were threatened.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and some of this comes from the over the
Speaker 5: hyper rhetoric about these things. People saying, oh my gosh,
Speaker 5: these justices are trying to end democracy as we know it.
Speaker 5: So you kind of amp this up. And look, we
Speaker 5: know that even in terms of some of the people
Speaker 5: who are doing these protests or even the ones in
Speaker 5: front of their homes, thank god, the vast majority of
Speaker 5: the people aren't actually violent.
Speaker 4: But we also know there are crazy people out there.
Speaker 5: When you see this kind of rhetoric and you and
Speaker 5: you tell these lies about people, is it surprising that
Speaker 5: you do get every once in a while a crazy
Speaker 5: person who then you know, packs his bags, puts in
Speaker 5: the zip ties and the gun and the knife and
Speaker 5: the everything, and flies across the country hoping to kill
Speaker 5: a justice.
Speaker 4: That is, you know, it is really reckless.
Speaker 5: And to have, as we've talked about before, members of
Speaker 5: the Senate who are throwing these threats out there and
Speaker 5: who are telling lies, saying that these justices are actually
Speaker 5: just you know, bought and paid for and this is
Speaker 5: that's that is you know, criminal, and it's and it's
Speaker 5: incredibly destructive to our national fabric to be trying to
Speaker 5: seed this, you know, these lies into the American people.
Speaker 5: We should be trying to encourage them to support the justices,
Speaker 5: and if you have arguments you want to make before
Speaker 5: the court, great, there are ways to do that. That's
Speaker 5: why we have an adversary process. There's always strong arguments
Speaker 5: on both sides of these important cases. Make your arguments
Speaker 5: to the justices in the courtroom. Don't try to make
Speaker 5: it to them with threats on.
Speaker 4: Their front lawn.
Speaker 1: Quick break and then more on the effort to delegitimize
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: It's not the rule of law under attack.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think most conservatives at least would say
Speaker 1: that we have an unequal application of the law. If
Speaker 1: you look at the way you know, the January sixth
Speaker 1: defendants are being treated versus you know, the George Floyd rioters,
Speaker 1: or you look at what they've done to pro lafers
Speaker 1: in America, well seemingly disinterested in fighting people who are
Speaker 1: firebombing pregnancy centers, or the treatment of Hillary Clinton versus
Speaker 1: the treatment of Trump people. You know, like, there's just
Speaker 1: so many examples of this broader sentiment that there is
Speaker 1: no equal application of the law anymore, and it is
Speaker 1: being weaponized against us.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, that is why the Supreme Court is
Speaker 5: so important to have in there as a check because
Speaker 5: there are, and you know, unfortunately there's in any system.
Speaker 5: This is why we have the constitutional system we do,
Speaker 5: because the founders new there is that temptation. Anytime you
Speaker 5: put a human being with this level of authority, there's
Speaker 5: going to be the temptation to say, weaponize it against
Speaker 5: your political enemies and not against your friends. This is why,
Speaker 5: for example, the First Amendment is supposed to be so
Speaker 5: strictly you know, equal viewpoint neutral. So you don't have
Speaker 5: the government saying some speech is more equal than others. Right,
Speaker 5: We're to let some.
Speaker 4: People speak, but not others.
Speaker 5: We need to be able to have this apply across
Speaker 5: the board, and so the Supreme Court's role is often
Speaker 5: to step in and say, okay, wait a minute. You know,
Speaker 5: I might even agree with what these people are saying,
Speaker 5: but I'm not going to allow them to weaponize the government.
Speaker 5: And we need to ensure that due process is being done,
Speaker 5: the law is being fairly applied, or you know, you
Speaker 5: fill in the blank issue that we're seeing happen. One
Speaker 5: of the key factors of a rule of law is
Speaker 5: that laws of the same laws apply to people regardless
Speaker 5: of whether you agree or disagree, regardless of whether they
Speaker 5: are a minority group or a majority group. And I think, unfortunately,
Speaker 5: there's a lot of aspects of our society that are
Speaker 5: really calling that into question right now, the idea of
Speaker 5: even handedness, whether it's the First Amendment and free speech
Speaker 5: or freedom of religion, or even the Fourteenth Amendment and
Speaker 5: equal protection.
Speaker 4: Hey, well some races are more equal than others.
Speaker 5: Nope, Nope, that's not that's not what the fourteenth the
Speaker 5: Mement says. And you know, regardless of whether you say, well,
Speaker 5: I've got benign reasons for applying it this way because
Speaker 5: I think I'm trying to just help good groups.
Speaker 4: You're okay, great, but that's again, that's not the rule
Speaker 4: of law.
Speaker 5: A rule of law means we have to apply all
Speaker 5: of these things even handedly and equally across the board.
Speaker 5: So I think that's why it's so important to have
Speaker 5: a court that can be independent and can provide that
Speaker 5: check when the elected branches aren't maybe don't follow their
Speaker 5: better angels in these cases, and are allowing themselves to
Speaker 5: weaponize our system.
Speaker 2: I understand that point.
Speaker 1: I guess what concerns me is, you know, we live
Speaker 1: in a country where it seems like, you know, some
Speaker 1: percentage of the country believes in the Constitution adheres to
Speaker 1: the Constitution, while the other percentage they want to set
Speaker 1: it on fire.
Speaker 5: Some of these really outspoken people on the left, you've
Speaker 5: heard even again, they're saying the quiet parwer out loud.
Speaker 5: It's explicitly saying, hey, the Constitution is trash and you
Speaker 5: know it needs to be changed or gotten rid of,
Speaker 5: and that is really dangerous. I think there's people who
Speaker 5: are treating the Constitution as a speed bump in terms
Speaker 5: of getting to where they want to go, rather than
Speaker 5: actually recognizing that the values it represents are important. And
Speaker 5: you know that can happen on either side, and there
Speaker 5: are some people in the extremes on either side who
Speaker 5: who forget that these protections are here to protect all
Speaker 5: of us and we need to hold them even handedly.
Speaker 5: I think the challenge is trying to I do think
Speaker 5: most Americans, even those on the on you know, on
Speaker 5: the left where people are some people are saying the
Speaker 5: Constitution needs to be shifted or changed if it's getting
Speaker 5: in the way of us enacting the policies we want.
Speaker 5: I think at the end of the day, most people
Speaker 5: do respect that, and I think this is part of
Speaker 5: the reason it's so important to make sure that we
Speaker 5: are actually teaching real civics to our kids, because these
Speaker 5: are such important lessons that, hey, even if we disagree
Speaker 5: on how to get to whatever result, we have to
Speaker 5: respect our constitutional system and the process. And I'm not
Speaker 5: sure that's being taught to our kids the way it
Speaker 5: was taught when when we were in school. So I
Speaker 5: think it's it's so important for them to learn that
Speaker 5: those values are core to our system and into it
Speaker 5: being able to function. And that's what allows us then
Speaker 5: to talk to our neighbors to try to, you know,
Speaker 5: adamantly argue for our opinions about the best policies while recognizing,
Speaker 5: you know, the the that their opinions actually get get
Speaker 5: to be heard in the public as well. That's that
Speaker 5: is not appreciated as well as should be nowadays. And
Speaker 5: I am hoping that we can do our best to
Speaker 5: reignite these values, because I do think that's what most
Speaker 5: people want at the end of the day, if they
Speaker 5: can stop and really think through the implications of these
Speaker 5: different systems.
Speaker 1: I do think it's with intention that kids are not
Speaker 1: being taught some of these things, because a dumb society
Speaker 1: is more easily indoctrinated. And I think that's the intention
Speaker 1: of what's happening in a lot of our schools these days.
Speaker 1: And to your point, it does seem like, you know,
Speaker 1: these attacks have been going on for a long time,
Speaker 1: but it's just or more overt now. I mean, there's
Speaker 1: no they're they're saying the quiet part out loud. There's
Speaker 1: no intention anymore to try.
Speaker 2: To conceal the attacks. It's just out in the open.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: In some ways it makes it easier because it's like, Wow,
Speaker 5: I don't have to tell you that this is their
Speaker 5: goal because they're saying it right. But I hope that
Speaker 5: maybe some people that'll give some people pause and say, wait,
Speaker 5: is that is that really how I want to live?
Speaker 5: Is that really the society that I want my children
Speaker 5: growing up in. I just hope that we can turn
Speaker 5: that around and remind people of those key foundational values
Speaker 5: before it's too late, before we lose them.
Speaker 1: Why do you think they haven't been able to find
Speaker 1: the dobs leaker? It doesn't seem like that would be
Speaker 1: that hard to be able to track the individual down.
Speaker 4: Well, it's interesting.
Speaker 5: Justice Alito just gave an interview in which he suggested
Speaker 5: that he pretty much knows who the Dobbs leaker is,
Speaker 5: and if he knows, I'm sure all the justices have
Speaker 5: a pretty good idea. I think their challenge is they
Speaker 5: don't have enough evidence to prove it to enough level
Speaker 5: that they would be able to, consistent with due process,
Speaker 5: actually publicize that person's name or really bring them to justice,
Speaker 5: because we know that they have committed it multiple I'm
Speaker 5: sure different potentially criminal offenses by leaking that. And it's
Speaker 5: interesting when the Marshall, the US Marshals gave the report
Speaker 5: on it, they listed all of the different statutes that
Speaker 5: were potentially violated by this leaker. So this is someone
Speaker 5: who in order to be really brought to justice, they're
Speaker 5: going to need an extra level of proof against I think.
Speaker 5: I think my guess is that not enough was done
Speaker 5: quickly enough. I think what we've seen from some of
Speaker 5: the marshals report and the information out there is that
Speaker 5: there were not enough procedures in place that would have
Speaker 5: allowed them to collect that evidence. I'm assuming those procedures
Speaker 5: have been put in place now so that you would know,
Speaker 5: say who's printed or save defile, or be able to
Speaker 5: follow the complete chain of custody of those documents in
Speaker 5: a way that they just didn't have in the system
Speaker 5: at all, which unfortunately, I think the Court really wasn't
Speaker 5: up to its game on the security. But I think
Speaker 5: I'm sure they're implementing some of those things now. I
Speaker 5: hope it's not too late, but I think they really
Speaker 5: did miss their main window for finding the person when
Speaker 5: everyone was still in the building, because by now, you
Speaker 5: know those clerks who are working that year, and the
Speaker 5: assumption it is a clerk, and even some of the
Speaker 5: more shorter terms chamber staff.
Speaker 4: Will have been gone long gone from the.
Speaker 5: Court at this point, So how do you have any
Speaker 5: more leverage over them? And we know that the staff
Speaker 5: of the court was all asked to swear under oath
Speaker 5: that they didn't have any knowledge of what happened. So
Speaker 5: someone out there has perjured him or herself, assuming that
Speaker 5: it was an internal court employee, which I think is
Speaker 5: almost almost certain, So that's it's going to be a
Speaker 5: real challenge. I think at this point we might not
Speaker 5: find out until that person outs him or herself, and
Speaker 5: that might be you know, they're gonna have to wait
Speaker 5: till after the Statute of Limitations runs on these crimes,
Speaker 5: they have committed if they don't want to get in
Speaker 5: a lot of trouble. So I think they're going to
Speaker 5: wait till they can cash in their New York Times
Speaker 5: best selling tell All. But it might not be for
Speaker 5: many years to come if they have to wait till,
Speaker 5: you know, the Statute of limitations runs on their actions here.
Speaker 2: I feel like this is just speculation.
Speaker 1: I obviously have no insider not on it, but I
Speaker 1: feel like it was a leftist justice and that's why
Speaker 1: there's such an effort to conceal it. I think if
Speaker 1: it was a staffer, they would have thrown that individual
Speaker 1: under the bus. That's just my own I literally have
Speaker 1: just purely speculative. I've got nothing, nothing to back it
Speaker 1: up besides guts.
Speaker 5: We know well, look, we know there are justices who
Speaker 5: regularly leaked the press because.
Speaker 4: We have seen reports.
Speaker 5: You know, there was a book recently by a CNN
Speaker 5: reporter that clearly has and going through from the Obamacare
Speaker 5: case on, we've had indications of what was going on
Speaker 5: behind closed doors that clearly only a justice would have known.
Speaker 5: So there are leakers among the justices and that's a
Speaker 5: real concern. What Justice Alito suggested, and maybe he's optimistic
Speaker 5: in this. He said, well, gosh, this is something that
Speaker 5: literally put the lives of six of the justices at risk.
Speaker 5: And he was responding to the fact that some people
Speaker 5: have just laughably suggested maybe he was the leaker or something.
Speaker 5: I'm like, he's like, you know, I had to go
Speaker 5: into hiding because to this leak. I don't think I
Speaker 5: would have leaked that that opinion, even to try to
Speaker 5: keep a justice from flipping at the last minute. And
Speaker 5: so what he I think was saying there too is
Speaker 5: if it was a justice, it was a justice who
Speaker 5: was acting with complete, reckless disregard for the lives of
Speaker 5: their colleagues. I think to me that suggests a little
Speaker 5: more was a clerk, because it was clearly a very
Speaker 5: naive move from someone who did not have a real
Speaker 5: interest in the institution of the court or even in
Speaker 5: the safety of the other justices. But you know that
Speaker 5: maybe that doesn't rule that out.
Speaker 4: I think. I hope we know someday, but it might
Speaker 4: not be for a while yet.
Speaker 1: You know, before we go carry, you know, a lot
Speaker 1: of people, a lot of Americans are facing a lot
Speaker 1: right now. You know, their minds are on being able
Speaker 1: to put food on the table, these different issues that
Speaker 1: are before them. Why is it important for people to
Speaker 1: be paying attention to maintaining the integrity of the Supreme Court?
Speaker 5: Well, whatever other issues you are concerned about, and obviously
Speaker 5: you know, this is the challenge in a situation where
Speaker 5: we are right now, where the economy is so bad,
Speaker 5: people are having a lot of you know, big deal issues,
Speaker 5: but all of those these problems, Ultimately, if we don't
Speaker 5: have a functional Supreme Court, we are not going to
Speaker 5: have that check that's going to keep the constitutional system
Speaker 5: in place, that's going to make sure that we have
Speaker 5: a country where you can be, you know, working in safety,
Speaker 5: trying to recover our economy. The rule of law is
Speaker 5: the reason we have We have had a good economy
Speaker 5: compare it worldwide standards up until now. If we lose that,
Speaker 5: we're going to lose all of these things. So whatever
Speaker 5: issue it is that you are really concerned about, you know,
Speaker 5: whether it's life, whether it's you know, your your right
Speaker 5: to keep in bear arms, whether it's equal protection, you know,
Speaker 5: whether it's the overgrowth of the administrative state which gets
Speaker 5: into all these different areas. That's what's underlying a lot
Speaker 5: of these problems. You saw issues with the mandatory COVID
Speaker 5: masking and vaccines, and you had issues with the with
Speaker 5: immigration law going you know which every which way you've
Speaker 5: had immigrations, with the student loan.
Speaker 4: Things.
Speaker 5: All of these issues are coming back to the court
Speaker 5: because the court's the one that's making sure the government
Speaker 5: stays within the boundaries of what the Constitution lays out
Speaker 5: for it.
Speaker 4: So, unfortunately, we can't.
Speaker 5: Afford to allow the court to just be to slip
Speaker 5: into being again an instrument of the left imposing it's
Speaker 5: it's policies on the country because all of those things
Speaker 5: are going to go with it if the court's not
Speaker 5: willing to be a check on the rest of the government.
Speaker 5: So I think it's still such a key issue, and
Speaker 5: think about it. You know, President Trump had so many
Speaker 5: different initiatives who was working on. He had a lot
Speaker 5: of great executive orders, all this stuff. Those things are
Speaker 5: basically wiped out already. The only impact, the biggest impact
Speaker 5: he had that still remains are the judges and the
Speaker 5: justices that he put on the court who will be
Speaker 5: there for a generation. The Left is going crazy about it.
Speaker 5: That's why we're seeing such a focus. They're so angry
Speaker 5: at this lasting legacy that we have on the courts,
Speaker 5: and this is why we need to just keep on
Speaker 5: focusing on that in the future, because that is one
Speaker 5: of the most long lasting and impactful things any president
Speaker 5: has the opportunity to do. So I'm very grateful we
Speaker 5: have that, but again President Biden's trying to undo it
Speaker 5: every day and he's nominating all sorts of crazy people.
Speaker 5: We just have to try to continue to elect people
Speaker 5: who will bring us judges and justices who can continue
Speaker 5: to be that check on our constitutional system.
Speaker 1: Well, it's also just really important as we see our
Speaker 1: liberties and freedoms under attack and we are increasingly living
Speaker 1: in a chaotic world, we need things like the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court to maintain order. Otherwise we will go the way
Speaker 1: of Venezuela and some of these other countries that we've mentioned,
Speaker 1: which seems to be the dream of the left, but
Speaker 1: would not be good for anyone listening us. So, Carrie Severino,
Speaker 1: President of JCN, I appreciate you taking the time to
Speaker 1: break down this important issue to the audience. I know
Speaker 1: you're busy, so I appreciate your time.
Speaker 4: Thanks talking to you.
Speaker 2: So that was Carrie.
Speaker 1: Severino, President of JCN, breaking down this attempt to delegitimize
Speaker 1: the Court. I mean, we really can't have this happen,
Speaker 1: as the Supreme Court is really one of the last
Speaker 1: institutions people have any faith in whatsoever, also pivotal to
Speaker 1: the rule of law in America. But I appreciate her
Speaker 1: joining the show. Appreciate you guys as always listening to
Speaker 1: the show. What do I thank John Cassio and my producer
Speaker 1: for putting it together every Monday and Thursday.
Speaker 2: You can listen throughout the week until next time.