Bored with failed efforts to impeach President Donald Trump, leftists are now turning to other government targets. This week, New York Magazine suggests that top man to fall in the Trump Administration should be Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
According to the magazine’s cover story, Justice Thomas is so irreparably terrible and historically problematic that Americans have no choice but to launch a recall effort aimed at replacing him with — who else? — a more liberal Justice.
“Lying is, for lawyers, a cardinal sin. State disciplinary committees regularly institute proceedings against lawyers for knowingly lying in court, with punishments that can include disbarment,” writes New York Times writer Jill Abramson. “Since 1989, three federal judges have been impeached and forced from office for charges that include lying. The idea of someone so flagrantly telling untruths to ascend to the highest legal position in the U.S. remains shocking, in addition to its being illegal.”
Abramson takes issue specifically with Thomas’ “lies” about his relationship with Anita Hill, a former colleague who accused Thomas of sexual harassment during Senate hearings, but who failed to derail Thomas’ confirmation. Hill faded into the background for decades, but has re-emerged as a star in the “#MeToo” era — even heading up a “Time’s Up” effort to educate women on how to fight back against workplace discrimination.
But what Abramson seems really mad about is Thomas’ record, which she calls “devastating for women” because Thomas has consistently ruled against expanding “reproductive rights,” and once voted in favor of allowing employers a religious exemption so that they would not have to provide their employees birth control free of charge (because, obviously, that left all women, across the country, financially destitute and forcibly pregnant).
And even if Abramson can’t prove Thomas actually lied or harassed anyone — something she at least implies, if not admits completely — Thomas’ hatred of women is so apparent in his decisions, he deserves to be booted.
“His worldview, with its consistent objectification of women, is the one that’s shaping the contours of what’s possible for women in America today, more than that of just about any man alive, save for his fellow justices,” she says.
Sadly, just because you disagree with a Supreme Court Justice doesn’t mean you can simply remove them from the bench (otherwise, conservatives might have tried that with Justice Ginsberg a long time ago). Justice Clarence Thomas is likely, and regrettably for Abramson at least, in it for the long haul.