Top Democrats who have been pressuring the Supreme Court to adopt a new code of ethics appear dissatisfied after the court\u2019s unprecedented announcement of a new Code of Conduct, saying the code alone isn\u2019t enough.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. said, \u2018It is long past time for a code of conduct that explicitly applies to the justices,\u2019 adding \u2018the lack of any way to enforce the code should any justice decide to ignore it is a glaring omission.\u2019<\/p>\n
Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said the new rules \u2018fall short\u2019 of what Congress \u2018could and should expect,\u2019 despite several Republicans saying Democrats\u2019 efforts would be unconstitutional.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018I\u2019m still reviewing the court\u2019s new code of conduct. For now, I will note that the court\u2019s adoption of this code marks a step in the right direction,\u2019 said Durbin.<\/p>\n
\u2018It may fall short of the ethical standards which other federal judges are held to, and that\u2019s unacceptable And if it falls short, the American people will ultimately have the last word, and the integrity of the court is at issue,\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., echoed that sentiment in comments via a video on X, formerly Twitter, calling the code a \u2018first step\u2019\u00a0and pushed for congressionally imposed enforcement rules.<\/p>\n
But a Republican Judiciary Committee member, Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, said, \u2018It\u2019s the court\u2019s role \u2013 not Congress\u2019 \u2013 to set out how they operate as an independent, coequal branch of government.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018The efforts from Senate Democrats \u2013 including with their recent subpoena authorization charade \u2013 are nothing more than an attempt to delegitimize the court as an institution, simply because they disagree with its recent decisions,\u2019 she charged.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Blackburn added the committee should focus its efforts on \u2018protecting the safety\u2019 of the justices and their families \u2018given the threats from the far left\u2019 they\u2019ve faced in recent months.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Last week, Democrats on the committee attempted to authorize subpoenas of private citizens for their connections to some of the justices on the court, but after Republicans countered with threatening to request subpoenas for things like Jeffrey Epstein\u2019s private jet manifests, Democrats appeared to sour on the idea.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the nine justices issued an unprecedented Code of Conduct, along with a statement that said, \u2018For the most part these rules and principles are not new: The Court has long had the equivalent of common law ethics rules, that is, a body of rules derived from a variety of sources, including statutory provisions, the code that applies to other\u00a0members of the federal judiciary, ethics advisory opinions issued by the Judicial Conference Committee on Codes of Conduct, and historic practice.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018The absence of a Code, however, has led in recent years to the misunderstanding that the Justices of this Court, unlike all other jurists in this country, regard themselves as unrestricted by any ethics rules,\u2019 they said.<\/p>\n
\u2018To dispel this misunderstanding, we are issuing this Code, which largely represents a codification of principles that we have long regarded as governing our conduct,\u2019 the justices added.<\/p>\n
The code is a set of five \u2018canons,\u2019 including two new provisions that appear to be in response to reports over travel arrangements for private trips taken by Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas paid by others, and use of court staff for book promotion \u2013 referring to a recent report on Justice Sonia Sotomayor\u2019s staff urging colleges and libraries to buy her latest book.<\/p>\n
But Durbin responded with thinly veiled criticism, saying, \u2018After years of refusing to act, a series of scandalous disclosures involving several justices on the court, and the Senate Judiciary Committee passing legislation sponsored by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse on ethical reform, the Supreme Court has finally responded.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2018Today, for the first time in history, the Supreme Court of the United States is at least saying to the American people: \u2018We hear you,\u201d he declared.<\/p>\n
Durbin said he will \u2018carefully review this proposed code of conduct to evaluate whether it complies with our goal that the highest court in the land not languish with the lowest standard of ethics in our federal government,\u2019 adding that it \u2018begins a dialogue which can end with restoring integrity of the court.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Carrie Severino, JCN president and a former clerk for Justice Thomas, predicted Tuesday that she doubts the code \u2018will satisfy Senate Democrats and their liberal dark-money backers, as their campaign has never really been about ethics but rather intimidating a court that it despises for being faithful to the Constitution.\u2019<\/p>\n
Democrats on the committee have pushed to pass the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency (SCERT) Act,\u00a0which would have required the Supreme Court to adopt a code of conduct, create a mechanism to investigate alleged violations of the code of conduct and other laws, update disclosure and transparency when a justice has a connection to a party or amicus before the court, and require justices to\u00a0explain their recusal decisions\u00a0to the public.<\/p>\n
But it was met with sharp criticism from Republicans, including Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., who said the measure would be \u201das dead as a fried chicken,\u2019 indicating that he did not believe the measure would earn the 60 votes needed to advance\u00a0on the Senate floor.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He also said the legislation is meant to be \u2018a court-killing machine.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2018It would allow any jackaloon out there in America in a tinfoil hat, whose own dog thinks he\u2019s an utter nutter, to file a motion to recuse a United States Supreme Court justice.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u2018Now, what could possibly go wrong? And my Democratic colleagues know that,\u2019 he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Kennedy said the bill is \u2018dangerous, but it\u2019s unserious.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n\n
Top Democrats who have been pressuring the Supreme Court to adopt a new code of ethics appear dissatisfied after the court\u2019s unprecedented announcement of a new Code of Conduct, saying the code alone isn\u2019t enough.\u00a0 Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. said, \u2018It is long past time for a code of conduct that explicitly applies to <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":11738,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11737","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11737"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11737\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}