Fearing that the Supreme Court could swing reliably to the Right if President Trump gets reelected, leftists are now openly pushing the idea of court-packing for the day that Democrats occupy the White House again.
On Monday, the far-left <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/expand-supreme-court-no-political-cost-democrats-take-back-the-court_n_5e4a1652c5b64d860fccca4b">HuffPost touted</a> a new academic study from political scientist Aaron Belkin of San Francisco State University and James Druckman of Northwestern University’s Institute for Policy Research that openly encouraged Democrats to pack the Supreme Court, asserting the party would face little political fallout, if any at all. The study was funded by the progressive group Take Back the Court, which has openly championed court-packing as a solution to a conservative judiciary.
In the study, participants were asked to choose between two hypotheticals: a &#8220;status quo&#8221; scenario and a scenario in which a Democratic Party candidate proposes court-packing to &#8220;bring greater balance to the court&#8221; while the Republican Party candidate laments how it would be “a threat to the independence of the judiciary and the rights of all Americans by radical liberals trying to change the rules so a few cities in New York and California can impose their will on the rest of us.” According to the study, scenario two had almost no impact on people&#8217;s choices.
&#8220;Among the dozens of correlations reported in the study, none indicated any statistically significant relationship between candidate endorsement of court expansion and consequences for the 2020 election,&#8221; reported HuffPost. &#8220;The only statistically significant finding is that when a Democratic candidate endorses court expansion, GOP voters come to feel 0.5% warmer toward the Republican Party.&#8221;
&#8220;Aside from that, candidate endorsement has no statistically significant impact on actual behavior, including the likelihood of voting or the likelihood of voting for a Democratic or Republican candidate,&#8221; it continued. &#8220;In other words, when Democratic candidates endorse court expansion, there is no impact on election results.&#8221;
Belkin believed that the study will likely push Democrats into mainstreaming the idea of court-packing so that it will no longer exist on the fringes.
“Judicial reform will be necessary to take our democracy back, and our data show that there is no reason for leaders to shy away from saying what needs to be said,” Belkin told HuffPost. “This is the time to address the threats we face explicitly and head on, and not bury our heads in the sand.”
Even liberal justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer have denounced the proposition of court-packing. Speaking with <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/07/24/744633713/justice-ginsburg-i-am-very-much-alive?utm_term=nprnews&amp;utm_campaign=politics&amp;utm_source=twitter.com&amp;utm_medium=social" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">NPR</a>, Ginsburg criticized past attempts to pack the Supreme Court, such as when President Franklin Roosevelt attempted to do so in the 1930s.
“Nine seems to be a good number,” the justice said. “It’s been that way for a long time. I think it was a bad idea when President Franklin Roosevelt tried to pack the Court.”
America largely agrees with both Ginsburg and Breyer, with a recent <a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/march_2019/voters_favor_term_limits_for_supreme_court_but_no_more_members">Rasmussen poll</a> indicating that Americans would rather see term limits on the Supreme Court before they see court-packing.
All that aside, prominent Democratic Party candidates have begun floating the idea of court-packing or some version of it, at least. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) openly stated during a presidential debate that he would rotate conservative justices off the Supreme Court if he became president.
“I do not believe in packing the court,” Bernie <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/48970/wacky-bernie-sanders-wants-rotate-justices-and-joseph-curl">proposed</a>. “We’ve got a terrible 5-4 majority conservative court right now. But I do believe constitutionally we have the power to rotate judges to other courts and that brings in new blood into the Supreme Court and a majority I hope that will understand that a woman has a right to control her own body and that corporations cannot run the United States of America.”

US-JUSTICE-SUPREME-COURT-GROUP-PHOTO

Academic ‘Study’ Encourages SCOTUS Packing: No Political Fallout For Democrats

Supreme Court

Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who is (<a href="https://nypost.com/2020/02/06/bloombergs-naked-bid-to-buy-the-white-house-is-an-assault-on-democracy/">quite literally</a>) currently attempting to buy the 2020 Democratic Party presidential nomination, has found himself in seriously hot water this week. A resurfaced audio clip from 2015 depicts the multibillionaire discussing in rather stark and unartful terms one key aspect of the famously aggressive policing policy he oversaw as New York City mayor. The clip can be <a href="https://twitter.com/BenjaminPDixon/status/1227067093692055553">heard here</a>, and The Daily Wire&#8217;s James Barrett <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-tweets-deletes-newly-uncovered-audio-of-bloomberg-total-racist">wrote it up</a> yesterday:
<blockquote>“95% of your murders — murderers and murder victims fit one M.O.,” Bloomberg allegedly states in the audio. “You can just take the description, Xerox it and pass it out to all the cops. They are male, minorities, 16–25. That’s true in New York, that’s true in virtually every city and that’s where the real crime is.” &#8230;
“So, one of the unintended consequences is people say, ‘oh my God, you are arresting kids for marijuana that are all minorities.’ Yes, that’s true. Why? Because we put all the cops in the minority neighborhoods,” he stated. “Yes, that’s true. Why do we do it? Because that’s where all the crime is. And the way you get the guns out of the kids’ hands is to throw them up against the walls and frisk them. And then they start say[ing], ‘Oh I don’t want to get caught.’ So they don’t bring the gun. They still have a gun, but they leave it at home.”</blockquote>
There is a lot to digest and break down here. First, Bloomberg&#8217;s statistics are <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/why-bloombergs-2015-stop-and-frisk-remarks-are-riddled-with-inaccuracies-john-lott">likely somewhat off</a>, at least using the FBI&#8217;s national Uniform Crime Reports as a helpful proxy for the local statistics in New York City itself. Second, Bloomberg&#8217;s line about &#8220;taking[ing] the description&#8221; of a suspect, &#8220;Xerox[ing] it, and pass[ing] it out to all the cops&#8221; is ugly and plays on some rather unsavory stereotypes. Third, and perhaps most importantly for those of us conservatives of a pro-police bent, Bloomberg&#8217;s rhetoric about &#8220;throw[ing]&#8221; kids &#8220;up against the walls&#8221; paints cops in an unfortunate light and does the thin blue line little in the way of justice or charity.
It would not be improper to describe this as racially charged rhetoric, even if it <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/walsh-bloomberg-isnt-racist-but-he-is-a-nanny-state-megalomaniac-control-freak">not per se racist rhetoric</a> because it is far likelier than not that Bloomberg simply exaggerated/misstated his statistics to make an overarching point. The <a href="https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2018/crime-in-the-u.s.-2018/topic-pages/expanded-homicide">FBI&#8217;s 2018 Uniform Crime Reporting Program states</a> that &#8220;[w]hen the race of the offender was known&#8221; in federal murders, &#8220;54.9% were Black or African American, 42.4% were White, and 2.7% were of other races.&#8221;
The underlying policing policy at issue is stop-and-frisk, which was largely implemented in the 1990s during then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani&#8217;s historic crime reduction in the Big Apple, and which was largely continued by then-Mayor Bloomberg during New York City&#8217;s tumultuous post-9/11 years. Contrary to Bloomberg&#8217;s inflammatory description in the leaked audio clip, here is how <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/stop_and_frisk">Cornell Law School&#8217;s Legal Information Institute (LII) describes</a> a cop&#8217;s stop-and-frisk procedure: &#8220;A stop-and-frisk refers to a brief non-intrusive police stop of a suspect. &#8230; If the police reasonably suspect that the suspect is armed and dangerous, the police may frisk the suspect, meaning that the police will give a quick pat-down of the suspect&#8217;s outer clothing.&#8221;
I understand that conservatives, (<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-here-are-three-reasons-why-i-plan-vote-josh-hammer">properly</a>) unified as the overwhelming majority of us are around Donald Trump&#8217;s hopeful re-election as president of the United States, see in Bloomberg&#8217;s audio clip an easy opportunity to score a cheap political shot. I also understand, as previously mentioned, that Bloomberg&#8217;s rhetoric is neither helpful nor (in all likelihood) truly statistically spot-on.
But conservatives, who largely defended stop-and-frisk policy while it was implemented by Giuliani and Bloomberg, must not now turn on it. Stop-and-frisk is (1) constitutional, (2) effective, and (3) proper.
The 1968 U.S. Supreme Court case of <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/392/1/">Terry v. Ohio</a> upheld standard stop-and-frisk procedure on Fourth Amendment grounds. &#8220;According to the Terry court,&#8221; LII notes, &#8220;a reasonable stop-and-frisk is one &#8216;in which a reasonably prudent officer is warranted in the circumstances of a given case in believing that his safety or that of others is endangered, he may make a reasonable search for weapons of the person believed by him to be armed and dangerous.'&#8221; The key words here are the multiple times &#8220;reasonable&#8221; (or some close derivative of it) is used. It is almost assuredly true that, while &#8220;probable cause&#8221; is traditionally required for the issuance of most search warrants, &#8220;reasonable suspicion&#8221; suffices as a legal standard to justify a mere stop-and-frisk of suspect believed to be armed and readily dangerous. The text of the Fourth Amendment, after all, prohibits &#8220;unreasonable searches and seizures&#8221; (emphasis added), and here there is necessarily &#8220;reasonable suspicion&#8221; for a Terry stop to be lawful. Some more libertarian-leaning conservatives may <a href="https://twitter.com/jonathanurick/status/1227435098879995904">disagree</a>, but I recall well my criminal procedure professor at the University of Chicago Law School, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Epstein">Richard Epstein</a>, announcing to our class his belief in the constitutional soundness of Terry. And Richard Epstein, for what it&#8217;s worth, is the single most influential libertarian legal theorist of the past century.
Stop-and-frisk policy in New York City, furthermore, was undoubtedly effective. &#8220;Since 1990, major crimes have fallen 81.9% in a period that spanned the administrations of four mayors, both Republican and Democratic, including Michael Bloomberg, who switched from being a Republican to an independent during his three terms in office,&#8221; Reuters <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-new-york-crime/murders-in-new-york-city-rose-in-2019-defying-long-term-decline-in-crime-rate-idUSKBN1Z525V">reported</a> last month while lamenting the fact that murders in the Big Apple actually rose last year under the infamously anti-cop reign of Mayor Bill de Blasio. While it is ultimately impossible to disentangle stop-and-frisk from other aspects of the Giuliani/Bloomberg anti-crime public policy portfolio, such as so-called &#8220;broken windows policing,&#8221; the reality is that New York City became one of the safest big cities in America over the exact same time span that stop-and-frisk proliferated in popularity. It is nothing short of tragic that <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jailbreak-is-to-blame-for-spike-in-nyc-crime-de-blasio-admits">de Blasio has reversed</a> these salutary trends.
Finally, stop-and-frisk, as implemented by Mayors Giuliani and Bloomberg, was a generally sound public policy initiative. It is simply true that law enforcement is beset by limited resources, and that police therefore have to routinely make decisions about how to maximize results — here, measured in terms of less crime and fewer criminals on the street — given those constraints. For example, prosecutorial discretion as a law enforcement concept has a centuries-long history in the Anglo-American tradition (that, of course, does not mean that prosecutorial secretion is not <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jeff-sessions-right-end-obamas-unlawful-approach-josh-hammer">sometimes bastardized</a>). Similarly, cops — the procedural antecedents, in a sense, to prosecutors — need to make on-the-ground decisions about where to best deploy resources in order to safeguard the public safety and the common weal. It is simply common sense that they would disproportionately target the neighborhoods where there is actually disproportionate crime committed.
By all means, conservatives can find proper bones to pick with Bloomberg&#8217;s resurfaced audio clip. But please do not lump in all of stop-and-frisk policy with those criticisms.

NYPD

HAMMER: Conservatives Should Not Oppose Stop-And-Frisk Policy

2020 Election

Bill de Blasio

Constitution

Crime

Democratic Party

Fourth Amendment

Michael Bloomberg

New York Police Department (NYPD)

Police

Racism

&#8220;In both law and politics, I think the essential battle is the meta-battle of framing the narrative. As Sun Tzu said, every battle is won before it’s fought. It’s won by choosing the terrain on which it will be fought.&#8221; – Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) to The New Yorker&#8217;s Jeffrey Toobin, <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/06/30/the-absolutist-2">June 2014</a>
Although President Donald Trump no doubt prefers to vent his off-the-cuff frustrations in tweet threads and campaign rallies, it is the planned teleprompter format in which he most clearly excels. Since assuming office, Trump&#8217;s State of the Union addresses have consistently been visceral, evocative, rhetorically fine-tune affairs that make brilliant use of audience guests to drive home his substantive agenda.
Last night&#8217;s speech was <a href="https://theresurgent.com/2020/02/04/best-state-of-the-union-ever/">no exception</a>, and the president was tremendously successful in framing the 2020 election as a stark choice between two competing visions of American governance: The economic prosperity, domestic security, and &#8220;peace through strength&#8221; deterrence of the Right, and the socialism, lawlessness, and capitulatory foreign policy of the Left. To borrow from Cruz&#8217;s quoting of Sun Tzu, Trump has &#8220;cho[sen] the terrain on which&#8221; the 2020 election &#8220;will be fought.&#8221;
The president <a href="https://thefederalist.com/2020/02/05/president-trump-offers-a-sharp-rebuke-of-socialism-at-precisely-the-right-time/">spoke at length</a> about the revving American economic engine, thus placing on the defensive the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-aocs-squad-will-destroy-democrats-2020-josh-hammer">toxic brand of socialism</a> that has come to dominate the modern Democratic Party. The Democrats are a political party with a <a href="https://www.predictit.org/markets/detail/3633/Who-will-win-the-2020-Democratic-presidential-nomination">statistical frontrunner</a> of a presidential nominee who is a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-bernie-sanders-entire-worldview-grotesquely-josh-hammer">lifelong communist activist</a> — a man who literally honeymooned in the Soviet Union and infamously hung a hammer-and-sickle Soviet flag inside his Burlington, Vermont mayoral office. They are advancing that nominee (and so many others who now mimic his economic illiteracy) in the context of an American electorate that, according to reliable pollster Gallup, is the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/americans-are-more-optimistic-about-the-economy-than-they-have-been-in-decades">most optimistic</a> it has been about the economy in decades. Americans <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_trump_job_approval_economy-6182.html">currently approve</a> of Trump&#8217;s handling of the economy by over 17%, and Democrats&#8217; solution for that is to stage a presidential primary where one of the leading &#8220;intellectual&#8221; debates among the candidates is whether to literally abolish private health insurance in favor of a government monopoly.
Good luck with that.
The president also spoke about the gruesome horrors of sanctuary cities, the great majority of which are <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-why-no-one-pointing-out-sanctuary-cities-josh-hammer">clearly illegal</a> under a straightforward reading of <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1373">8 U.S.C. § 1373(a)</a>: &#8220;Notwithstanding any other provision of Federal, State, or local law, a Federal, State, or local government entity or official may not prohibit, or in any way restrict, any government entity or official from sending to, or receiving from, the [Department of Homeland Security] information regarding the citizenship or immigration status, lawful or unlawful, of any individual.&#8221; The president masterfully provided gut-wrenching details of the crimes committed by illegal aliens mollycoddled by sanctuary jurisdictions — thus seemingly borrowing a tactic from Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas, each of whom has at times provided vivid details of the underlying murders of those defendants whose capital punishment appeals reach the Court. Trump forced Democrats in the House chamber to retreat to the unenviable position of loudly booing his oratory assaults on criminal aliens and the sanctuary jurisdictions that harbor them. It was a remarkable sight to behold.
The president has thus successfully framed the 2020 election as a referendum about whether the nation will reject the Left&#8217;s two most profoundly ruinous current hobbyhorses: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-a-political-wish-for-2020-less-socialism-more-law-and-order">Socialism and lawlessness</a>. He also spoke directly to the heart and mind of the proverbial <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-who-will-stand-for-the-forgotten-american">forgotten American</a> — the tax-paying, church-attending, law-abiding American who still has an innate love and appreciation for what has always made America great. Say what one might about Trump, but one cannot plausibly deny that he is an &#8220;Americanist,&#8221; properly understood.
The American people will head to the ballot box this November with an exceedingly straightforward choice before them. Here is hoping they make the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-here-are-three-reasons-why-i-plan-vote-josh-hammer">right decision</a>.

President Trump Delivers State Of The Union Address

HAMMER: Trump Successfully Framed The Stark 2020 Election Choice During Last Night’s SOTU Address

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

Clarence Thomas

Communism

Donald Trump

Economy

Law Enforcement

Qassem Soleimani

Radical Islam

A new documentary is currently making the rounds of limited release that explores the life of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. &#8216;Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in his Own Words&#8217; offers its viewers a unique perspective on one of America’s most contentious and quietly brilliant men.
Thomas has, of course, been a contentious figure in American politics ever since his confirmation hearing in 1991 — when President George H. W. Bush nominated him for the position of Supreme Court associate justice. Thomas was quickly accused of sexually harassing a female subordinate, Anita Hill, earlier in his career. While the FBI quickly ruled out the claim, her testimony was leaked to the public and devolved into a heated series of public sexual harassment hearings prior to his confirmation.
The movie doesn’t pretend that it isn’t taking a stance on Justice Thomas’s innocence. If anything, his accusation draws immediate comparisons in the movie to the conspicuously similar accusations made 27 years later against then-Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. Alas, in the scheme of lionizing Supreme Court justices, a single documentary about Justice Thomas pales in comparison to the multitude of biopics and documentaries made about progressive darling Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg.
&#8216;Created Equal&#8217; is a documentary that merely puts his perspective in the spotlight. It’s primarily composed as a one-on-one sit-down interview with the now 71-year-old justice as he reflects on his life, politics, and his stances on constitutional law. Anyone who has read his memoir, &#8216;My Grandfather’s Son,&#8217; will likely be familiar with some of the highlights of his journey — but for first-time viewers, his life will likely be rather striking. Born in rural Georgia during segregation, Justice Thomas endured both poverty and unimaginable racial prejudice.  He was largely sheltered from the worst of it via his relationship with his grandfather, who put him to work as a part-time laborer and a farmer with strict standards and expectations. After a falling out with his grandfather, he underwent a period of radicalization amidst the turmoil of the Civil Rights Movement and moved politically to the far-left. After graduating from College of the Holy Cross and subsequently Yale Law School, he eventually received a job working with the attorney general of Missouri, and future Republican U.S. senator, John Danforth.
While most of the back half the documentary deals with the results of his Supreme Court nomination and subsequent confirmation, the first half ends up being the more revealing half. Seeing his path from the most oppressed rungs of American society to becoming an associate justice is nothing short of inspiring. He is, in every respect, the embodiment of the American dream. His position of power now is a reflection of a lifetime of struggle, hard work, and self-reflection as he grew into the man he is today.
Seeing him grow from a leftist into the most famously conservative man on the Supreme Court is equally fascinating. That journey, though less fraught than his upbringing, required years of intellectual wrestling with his leftist tendencies as he developed his originalist stance on constitutional interpretation. After years of attending political conventions and arguing with friends, he developed a strong sense of constitutional fidelity birthed from his love for the Founders and their vision for an American government.
That immense wellspring of knowledge about the nature of the American Founding subsequently gives Thomas&#8217;s perspective of his confirmation hearings a rather hilarious undercurrent. Watching him explain how then-Senator Joe Biden’s (D-DE) contortions of political theory amounted to little more than an attempt to make him reveal his positions on abortion is nothing short of hilarious. The Democrats&#8217; line of interrogation during the Senate confirmation hearings was clearly nothing but an attempt to make him stumble as part of the Left’s effort to destroy a black man holding, as Thomas puts it, the &#8220;wrong&#8221; opinions.
Being black and a conservative always put Justice Thomas at odds with the progressive Left. Given his Catholic faith, as well as his personal stances against forced busing and welfare, he drew immense amounts of acrimony from those who hated him well before Anita Hill made her accusations known. Thomas is, in every respect, the kind of public figure the Left should hold up as a success story for the black community. Yet the Left casually dismisses him as a race traitor. Thomas is clearly still bothered by some of the horrifically racist rhetoric that has been used against him throughout his career.
For bringing much of this history to the public’s attention, &#8216;Created Equal&#8217; is a vitally important piece of both journalism and history. Thomas’ stories feel all too familiar in an age of #MeToo accusations and racial identitarianism. Much of the vitriol he spent his career fighting sadly remains a stubborn fact today. The perspective he brings to life, law, and morality is immensely valuable and inspiring. To this day, his name is invoked on the Left as an example of a prominent man being let off the hook for sexual impropriety. The film makes clear Thomas’ name, reputation, and beliefs were dragged through the mud. Thankfully, such a horrific show didn’t destroy the man. He is today as humble, intelligent, proud, faithful, and patriotic as he’s ever been.

HUMMEL: ‘Created Equal’: New Documentary Sheds Light On The Life Of Justice Clarence Thomas

Abortion

Blacks

Conservatism

Hollywood

Judicial Branch

Judiciary

Leftism

Progressivism

As The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-considering-dramatic-expansion-of-terrorist-nations-added-to-travel-ban-list">previewed weeks ago</a> and as has also been rumored for much of this current week, the Trump administration on Friday imposed travel restrictions on six new countries.
&#8220;President Donald Trump is expected to reveal an expansion of his controversial travel ban on Friday, the same day he could be acquitted in his impeachment trial and just days ahead of the president’s annual State of the Union address,&#8221; Politico <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/30/trump-travel-ban-expansion-109659">reported</a> yesterday. &#8220;The expected announcement — confirmed by two people familiar with the matter — had initially been planned for this past Monday to coincide with the three-year anniversary of the original order, which restricted travel from several majority-Muslim nations.&#8221;
On Friday afternoon, The Wall Street Journal <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-administration-imposes-new-travel-restrictions-on-six-countries-11580500874?emailToken=ee9c4d96fd7222587f6a95ea5366a1faJTb2EUg+d0M9bUrQCrIOQzQ91WSepUbYHQgY9Wk%2F8tABR%2F6914m7UCcOGLZysxL+RosZfgYd3Lb8J2OSgyyjyduSEnQYimX%2FldifLfWwadKmtNJ7tcwwfsnO5mS8469GWPrBhircuAoxdsFvkggkYQ%3D%3D&amp;reflink=article_whatsapp_share&amp;fbclid=IwAR03FzpEH7xWpUAx8Zyh0wkm5hGE__rlQ_gQW9NIAzsU5wuLbIvKnm8_tAc">confirmed the news</a>. The six new countries to have various types of travel restrictions imposed upon them are Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan, Sudan, and Tanzania.
&#8220;Citizens from Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar and Kyrgyzstan won’t be allowed to apply for visas to immigrate to the U.S. under the policy, which the Trump administration said was designed to tighten security for countries that don’t comply with the U.S. minimum security standards or cooperate to prevent illegal immigration,&#8221; the Journal reports. &#8220;Two other countries, Sudan and Tanzania, will be barred from participating in the diversity visa lottery, which randomly awards green cards to 50,000 immigrants from underrepresented countries annually. Many of the recipients are from African countries.&#8221;
Specifically, Nigeria, Eritrea, Myanmar and Kyrgyzstan will have the issuance suspended of all visas that might lead to permanent residency, according to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-ban/trump-to-expand-travel-ban-to-six-additional-countries-u-s-official-idUSKBN1ZU2WD">Reuters</a>.
Overall, &#8220;[t]he six countries [added today] will join a list of seven nations, most of them Muslim-majority, that faced significant travel restrictions under President Trump’s original travel ban, issued in 2017,&#8221; the Journal continues. Those original seven nations were Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Venezuela, and North Korea.
That original travel ban was ultimately upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in the attention-grabbing 2018 case of <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/17pdf/17-965_h315.pdf">Trump v. Hawaii</a>.
&#8220;By its plain language, [8 U.S.C.] §1182(f) grants the president broad discretion to suspend the entry of aliens into the United States,&#8221; Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for a bare 5–4 Court majority. &#8220;The president lawfully exercised that discretion based on his findings — following a worldwide, multi-agency review — that entry of the covered aliens would be detrimental to the national interest. And plaintiffs’ attempts to identify a conflict with other provisions in the [Immigration and Nationality Act], and their appeal to the statute’s purposes and legislative history, fail to overcome the clear statutory language.&#8221;
The addition of countries with Trump administration-imposed travel restrictions placed upon them surely has a political element, and can likely be viewed as an attempt by the president to help shore up his base in the lead-up to November&#8217;s election. But the primary rationale seems to be a more emotionally detached attempt to buttress homeland security.
“These countries for the most part want to be helpful, want to do the right thing,” said Chad Wolf, acting Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, according to the Journal. “But for a variety of reasons, they failed to meet those requirements we laid out.”

Passport on the desk of an American businessman

BREAKING: Trump Admin Adds New Travel Restrictions For Six Countries

Department of Homeland Security

Illegal Immigration

Immigrants

Immigration

John Roberts

Lawsuit

Muslim Immigration

The Trump administration secured a crucial victory in the United States Supreme Court on Monday when the court ruled in favor of allowing the administration to proceed with denying green cards and citizenship to foreign nationals who receive welfare benefits from the American taxpayer.
The Daily Caller News Foundation <a href="https://dailycaller.com/2020/01/27/public-charge-rule-supreme-court/">reported</a>:
<blockquote>The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) dictates that foreign nationals should not receive green cards if they are “likely at any time to become a public charge.” At issue in Monday’s case is the definition of “public charge.” In recent years, the term was defined as a person primarily dependent on a cash assistance program.
The Trump administration promulgated a new rule in August 2019 that expands the definition to include those likely to use non-cash benefit programs like Medicaid, food stamps, or housing benefits for a period of months. The rule does not apply to humanitarian migrants like refugees or asylum-seekers.</blockquote>
The ruling lifts a nationwide injunction placed on imposed by Democrat-appointed Manhattan-based U.S. District Judge George Daniels.
White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham responded to the win by saying, “Today’s stay from the Supreme Court is a massive win for American taxpayers, American workers, and the American Constitution. This decision allows the government to implement regulations effectuating longstanding federal law that newcomers to this country must be financially self-sufficient and not a ‘public charge’ on our country and its citizens.”
Immigration reporter Neil Munro <a href="https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/01/27/supreme-court-allows-rule-excluding-poor-old-migrants/">noted</a> that this was a win for &#8220;Americans employees, whose wages are being suppressed, and housing costs are rising amid the business-backed inflow of roughly 1 million immigrant workers, consumers, and renters each year.&#8221;
The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) said in a statement:
<blockquote>“In a well-deserved blow to an activist judge in the Southern District of New York, today the Supreme Court lifted a nationwide injunction on President Trump’s common sense, long overdue &#8216;public charge&#8217; rule, allowing it to go in effect during the course of litigation. This is a massive victory for the Trump administration, the American people, and most importantly, preserves the public interest component of an immigration system constantly under attack by special interest judges. The rule will correct expensive and politically-driven loopholes, and uphold the clearly expressed intent of Congress that immigrants to the United States be self-reliant. That means putting back in place screening criteria that identifies and selects prospective immigrants who will be less likely to depend on government programs and become public charges. The interest of the American people is best served when immigrants selected for admission into the United States can demonstrate they are capable of providing for themselves and their dependents. While lower court litigation continues, the rule takes effect immediately. Given that the arguments against public charge are meritless, it is likely this rule change is permanent.”</blockquote>
Far-left Democrats reacted in anger over the ruling.
Socialist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) wrote on Twitter: &#8220;This is shameful. America shouldn’t have a wealth test for admission. It’s a place where millions of people are descendants of immigrants who came w nothing &amp; made a life. The American Dream isn’t a private club with a cover charge &#8211; it’s the possibility of remaking your future.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
This is shameful. America shouldn’t have a wealth test for admission. It’s a place where millions of people are descendants of immigrants who came w nothing &amp; made a life.
The American Dream isn’t a private club with a cover charge &#8211; it’s the possibility of remaking your future. <a href="https://t.co/qKm7BuUhXI">https://t.co/qKm7BuUhXI</a>
&mdash; Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) <a href="https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1221883795672129540?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 27, 2020</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), who is currently one the Democrat front-runners seeking the party&#8217;s nomination in the presidential race, responded: &#8220;My father came to America at 17 without a nickel, speaking no English. He grew up to be the proudest American you ever saw. Trump&#8217;s policy is disgraceful. It is not what America is about. We will defeat him and end his demonization of immigrants and the poor.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
My father came to America at 17 without a nickel, speaking no English. He grew up to be the proudest American you ever saw. Trump&#39;s policy is disgraceful. It is not what America is about. We will defeat him and end his demonization of immigrants and the poor. <a href="https://t.co/MibtwOTzEL">https://t.co/MibtwOTzEL</a>
&mdash; Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) <a href="https://twitter.com/BernieSanders/status/1221872540177567744?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 27, 2020</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Far-left transgender activist Charlotte Clymer wrote: &#8220;America has just erected a paywall. This is astoundingly cruel.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
America has just erected a paywall. This is astoundingly cruel. <a href="https://t.co/PiN2FQKlL1">https://t.co/PiN2FQKlL1</a>
&mdash; Charlotte Clymer🏳️‍🌈 (@cmclymer) <a href="https://twitter.com/cmclymer/status/1221865680426934273?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 27, 2020</a></blockquote>
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US-POLITICS-TRUMP-WALL

Trump Administration Gets Crucial Immigration Win In Supreme Court. Far-Left Explodes.

Since its founding in 1982, <a href="https://fedsoc.org">The Federalist Society</a> (FedSoc), the nation&#8217;s leading conservative/libertarian legal group, has been a simply <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Federalist-Society-Conservatives-Took-Liberals/dp/082651877X">remarkable</a> <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Ideas-Consequences-Conservative-Counterrevolution-Development/dp/0190933747/ref=asc_df_0190933747/?tag=hyprod-20&amp;linkCode=df0&amp;hvadid=366282406038&amp;hvpos=1o1&amp;hvnetw=g&amp;hvrand=8992389821330317855&amp;hvpone=&amp;hvptwo=&amp;hvqmt=&amp;hvdev=c&amp;hvdvcmdl=&amp;hvlocint=&amp;hvlocphy=9026920&amp;hvtargid=pla-796690064135&amp;psc=1&amp;tag=&amp;ref=&amp;adgrpid=78795692560&amp;hvpone=&amp;hvptwo=&amp;hvadid=366282406038&amp;hvpos=1o1&amp;hvnetw=g&amp;hvrand=8992389821330317855&amp;hvqmt=&amp;hvdev=c&amp;hvdvcmdl=&amp;hvlocint=&amp;hvlocphy=9026920&amp;hvtargid=pla-796690064135">success story</a>. And due to its breathtaking success in inculcating constitutionalist fidelity in a generation of law students and genuinely impacting the shape of the federal judiciary, it is perhaps true that no organization alive today better encapsulates the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vast_right-wing_conspiracy">&#8220;vast right-wing conspiracy&#8221;</a> that once drew the ire of a younger Hillary Clinton.
The Left, which holds a special disdain for FedSoc due to both its influence and its success in countering the erstwhile ubiquitous (and still <a href="https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/ucla-professor-bainbridge-hero-of-diversity/">overwhelming</a>) leftist groupthink pervading the legal profession, has been on a particularly vicious anti-FedSoc warpath throughout the entirety of the Trump presidency. The Trump administration&#8217;s judicial nomination machine is a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/one-in-every-four-circuit-court-judges-is-now-a-trump-appointee/2019/12/21/d6fa1e98-2336-11ea-bed5-880264cc91a9_story.html">behemoth</a>, and the Left despises the organization most responsible for steering this new generation of judges toward the direction of constitutional originalism. Indeed, the Left would like nothing more than to take down FedSoc.
Unless Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts now intervenes, the Left may come about as close to achieving its goal as it could feasibly get.
The <a href="https://www.uscourts.gov/topics/judicial-conference-united-states">Judicial Conference of the United States</a>, an arcane body <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/331">established by Congress</a> and led by the chief justice of the Supreme Court, is responsible for helping establish the national policy guidelines that govern the administration of the federal courts. In addition to the chief justice, the Conference consists of a <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/28/331">cross-section of judges</a> from the many federal courts.
Alas, the Conference is arcane no longer. Over the past week, the Conference&#8217;s Committee on Codes of Conduct, which oversees federal judicial ethics, has forced a national conversation by launching an absolute wrecking ball of a <a href="http://eppc.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Guide-Vol02B-Ch02-AdvOp11720OGC-ETH-2020-01-20-EXP-1.pdf">draft advisory opinion</a>. The Committee, which is <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/judicial-political-mischief-11579652574">chaired by</a> Judge Ralph Erickson of the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals, has 15 total <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/re-draft-judicial-ethics-opinion-favors-aba-over-federalist-society-and-acs/">members</a>: Eight Democratic presidential nominees, five Republican presidential nominees, and two others (a bankruptcy judge and a magistrate judge).
The Committee&#8217;s advisory opinion, if formally implemented by the Committee, would &#8220;advise[] that formal affiliation&#8221; with both FedSoc and the <a href="https://www.acslaw.org">American Constitution Society</a> (ACS), FedSoc&#8217;s (<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/more-judicial-political-mischief-11579825335">much</a>) more <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/judicial-campaign-to-silence-federalist-society-part-1/">overtly political</a> progressive counterpart, &#8220;is inconsistent with&#8221; the governing Code of Conduct for United States Judges. Specifically, the Committee states that &#8220;although neither [FedSoc nor ACS] is a &#8216;political organization'&#8221; under the Code, &#8220;their activities nevertheless implicate [the Code&#8217;s] broad prohibition against political activity&#8221; — whatever that is supposed to mean. What&#8217;s worse, the draft opinion also holds that federal judges&#8217; law clerks and staff attorneys must not join either FedSoc or ACS. But on the other hand, membership with the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-who-cares-about-the-abas-judicial-nominee-ratings">leftist</a>, <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/draft-judicial-ethics-opinion-favors-aba-over-federalist-society-and-acs/">remarkably biased</a> American Bar Association (ABA) &#8220;does not raise these same concerns and is not necessarily inconsistent with the Code.&#8221;
Where to begin?
First, as has been pointed out by both The Wall Street Journal <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/more-judicial-political-mischief-11579825335">editorial board</a> and the Judicial Crisis Network&#8217;s <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/judicial-campaign-to-silence-federalist-society-part-1/">Carrie Severino</a>, there is simply no comparing FedSoc and ACS in terms of their respective levels of &#8220;political activity.&#8221; I have been a (literally) card-carrying FedSoc member since I began law school at the University of Chicago, was a three-year board member of my law school&#8217;s <a href="http://federalist.uchicago.edu">chapter</a>, and now serve as a FedSoc <a href="https://fedsoc.org/contributors/josh-hammer">campus speaker</a>. I am intimately familiar with this organization, and have benefitted from it in many different ways. In short, there is no such thing as a FedSoc &#8220;position&#8221; on any given legal, let alone political, issue. The organization stands for one unifying proposition and one unifying proposition only: Words, as used in legal texts such as constitutions and statutes, have discernible meanings. That is truly it. FedSoc routinely hosts debates where one member debates another; what&#8217;s more, constitutional originalists ourselves frequently disagree when it comes to interpreting any number of constitutional or statutory provisions. By contrast, at the time of the Brett Kavanaugh Supreme Court nomination battle, ACS&#8217;s president <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/more-judicial-political-mischief-11579825335">publicly opposed</a> the nominee. ACS also flaunts specific legal briefs, has an aggressively politicized <a href="https://twitter.com/acslaw">social media</a> presence, and issues press releases on such über-politicized things as <a href="https://www.acslaw.org/press_release/u-s-senate-must-place-principles-above-politics-in-impeachment-process/">presidential impeachment</a>. As such, any comparison between FedSoc and ACS amounts, as the Journal&#8217;s editorial board recently <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/judicial-political-mischief-11579652574">put it</a>, to a &#8220;false equivalence.&#8221;
Second, even holding aside the organizations&#8217; competing merits and demerits, attempting to neuter both FedSoc and ACS in one fell swoop harms FedSoc and the cause of constitutional originalism far more than it harms ACS and the cause of &#8220;living constitutionalism.&#8221; ACS was founded 19 years after FedSoc, and it has never come even remotely close to FedSoc in terms of influence, prestige, network, membership, or any of the other metrics by which to assess organizations such as these. There are multiple reasons for this. Liberals have controlled the legal academy, the federal judiciary, and the legal profession alike for most of the past century. FedSoc, accordingly, was founded to help supply a hugely under-served market: Right-leaning law students and lawyers. FedSoc, and the law professors and judges who came up through its ranks, thus presents a desperately needed counterweight to the sclerosis of leftist legal academia. ACS&#8217;s entire mission is therefore effectively duplicative and unnecessary; at the time of ACS&#8217;s founding, the Left still dominated the legal profession. Furthermore, FedSoc&#8217;s overwhelmingly simple and easily relatable <a href="https://fedsoc.org/about-us">mission statement</a> also stands in sharp contrast to the nebulous, transparently outcome-oriented nostrums <a href="https://www.acslaw.org/about-us/">peddled by ACS</a>. The inclusion of FedSoc as a subject of the Committee&#8217;s wrath — and, by downstream effect, a subject of increased ostracism on the law school campus — would thus disproportionately undermine the academic and intellectual integrity of legal education and the legal profession much more than does the inclusion of ACS.
Third, it is ludicrous for the Committee to let the ABA off the hook. The ABA, which has brazenly <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/the-confirmation-process-that-was-then-this-is-trump/" data-reader-unique-id="10">attempted</a> to <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-who-cares-about-the-abas-judicial-nominee-ratings">claim</a> many high-profile Trump judicial nominee <a href="http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/seventeen_judicial_nominees_advance_to_the_senate_including_two_rated_not_q" data-reader-unique-id="11">scalps</a>, is institutionally controlled by leftist trial lawyers and bigwig Democratic Party donors. The ABA, unlike FedSoc, &#8220;<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/judicial-political-mischief-11579652574">takes positions on countless legal subjects, invariably on the political left</a>.&#8221; The ABA has a &#8220;House of Delegates&#8221; that, going back to the 1970s, <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/another-self-inflicted-wound-for-the-aba/">actually passes many resolutions</a> taking formal positions on all the hot political issues of the day. Surprise, surprise: The ABA always comes down on the left side of a given issue. As Severino <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/judicial-campaign-to-silence-federalist-society-part-2/">observes</a>, the ABA&#8217;s <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/government_affairs_office/legisslist-august-2019.pdf?logActivity=true">current list</a> of “Legislative Policies” advances actual legislative proposals &#8220;spanning such varied subjects as admiralty law, criminal procedure, energy, medical malpractice, public contracts, and tax.&#8221; It even files legal briefs on cases on issues as highly charged as <a href="https://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/news/2019/12/june-v-gee-amicus.PDF">abortion</a>. There is no sane world in the ABA is somehow less &#8220;political&#8221; than FedSoc, which does precisely none of the above — preferring instead to focus on preaching the scandalously bold sole message that texts ought to be interpreted according to their original public meanings.
Finally, and arguably most importantly, the career consequences of this proposed Committee opinion for law students, law clerks, and young lawyers alike is nothing short of tragic. Marking FedSoc with such an institutional scarlet letter as this would tremendously disincentivize those at the start of their legal careers from joining the organization, lest they be seen as too &#8220;political&#8221; for the judges who might one day look to hire them for prestigious clerkships. As such, fewer law students will populate FedSoc chapters, and the powerful national FedSoc network of law students, lawyers, academics, and judges would be depleted as the risk-averse among us run for the hills en masse. Right-leaning law students hoping to clerk for right-leaning judges would be put at a tremendous disadvantage, as they would have diminished opportunities to network and formally interact with those who might hire them; left-leaning law students, of course, would hardly be hurt at all by the slap to ACS, because the clerkship hiring bureaucracies in elite law schools are already unilaterally stacked leftward. Intellectual diversity in the classroom will also be hurt, as lonesome conservative students might be less willing to voice their viewpoints out of fear they might harm their career advancement than they otherwise would be. As a consequence, the Committee&#8217;s ostensible attempt to de-politicize the judiciary would have the unintended consequence of only further politicizing the state of legal discourse at the nation&#8217;s law schools, and within the legal profession more broadly, by ensuring that there is no viable counter-programming to stand athwart otherwise-monolithic legal leftism.
The Committee&#8217;s proposed draft opinion amounts to nothing less than a travesty. By purportedly attempting to de-politicize the judiciary, the Committee has inadvertently risked only further politicizing and tearing asunder the legal profession. But it is not yet too late. Chief Justice Roberts, who heads the Judicial Conference, can still not-so-subtly tell Judge Erickson and the rest of the Committee to preemptively put the kibosh on this destructive endeavor. For the sake of all parties involved, Roberts — who values perhaps nothing more than he does institutional integrity and preservation of the federal courts&#8217; alleged de-politicization —  must take a brief break from his Senate impeachment trial presiding officer duties and do so immediately.

Chief Justice John Roberts

HAMMER: Chief Justice Roberts Must Overrule The Judiciary’s Proposed Assault On The Federalist Society

academia

Brett Kavanaugh

Federalist

&#8220;I&#8217;ve noticed that everyone who is for abortion has already been born.” – President Ronald Reagan
Today is the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-at-march-for-life-we-are-fighting-for-those-who-have-no-voice-and-we-will-win">47th March for Life</a> in Washington, D.C. For nearly five decades, dating back to the one-year anniversary of the abominable Roe v. Wade decree, Americans from all walks of life have braved the January cold to march together in solidarity with the most vulnerable subset of the human population: The unborn. It is a remarkable display of unity in defiance of a grave injustice that stains our collective national conscience.
Roe, of course, is just as morally abhorrent as it is constitutionally fabricated. As I <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-hammer-on-tipping-point-with-liz-wheeler-the-legal-argument-to-overturn-roe">explained</a> earlier this week on Liz Wheeler&#8217;s One America News program, there is nothing whatsoever in the original public meaning or plain text of the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause — which states, &#8220;nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law&#8221; — that transmogrifies the inherently elitist U.S. Supreme Court into an institution that can unilaterally impose abortion policy upon a nation as diverse as ours. As U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit Judge William Pryor <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-judge-william-pryor-is-yet-again-a-victim-of-the-lefts-war-on-truth">said</a> at his Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing, Roe is &#8220;unsupported by the text and structure of the Constitution, [and] it has [also] led to a morally wrong result. It has led to the slaughter of millions of innocent unborn children.&#8221;
But don&#8217;t take it from just avowed pro-lifers; iconic leftist Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has even <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/the-forgotten-history-of-justice-ginsburgs-criticism-of-roe-v-wade/2016/03/01/9ba0ea2e-dfe8-11e5-9c36-e1902f6b6571_story.html">opined</a> that Roe was incorrect, as a matter of law. Ditto famously liberal longtime Harvard Law School professor John Hart Ely, who <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB122704335139038479">once said</a> that Roe &#8220;is not constitutional law and gives almost no sense of an obligation to try to be.&#8221;
The fight for the unborn is the human rights struggle of our time. The <a href="https://twitter.com/josh_hammer/status/1220797862017191943">comparisons</a> to antebellum chattel slavery are <a href="https://www.redstate.com/erick/2015/10/26/yes-the-arguments-for-abortion-do-parallel-the-arguments-defending-slavery/">remarkable</a>: Both involve treating fellow human beings as property to be harmed at will, both were upheld by the Supreme Court on constitutional grounds via the Fifth/Fourteenth Amendment <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/five-lessons-abraham-lincoln-would-have-todays-josh-hammer">doctrinal ruse</a> known as &#8220;substantive due process,&#8221; both are deemed <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer">beyond reproach</a> by <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1260996">judicial supremacists</a>, and the opposition to each is led by the Republican Party. As iconic conservative Princeton University professor <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-iconic-conservative-leader-requests-ag-barr-address-pornography">Robert P. George</a> co-wrote in 2004 <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2004/08/republicans-and-relics-barbarism-robert-p-george-william-l-saunders/">at National Review</a>: &#8220;For the Republicans&#8221; of the Civil War era, &#8220;the idea that human beings could be reduced to the status of mere &#8216;objects&#8217; to be bought and sold and exploited for the benefit of others was a profound violation of the intrinsic dignity of creatures made in the image and likeness of God.&#8221; Abortion is similarly a &#8220;profound violation of the intrinsic dignity of creatures made in the image and likeness of God.&#8221; &#8221;
The reality is that the conservative movement, and the Republican Party with which it is intertwined, simply must come to view Roe and its murderous progeny as indistinguishable from the infamous Dred Scott decision of 1857 that directly precipitated the Civil War. &#8220;As with Roe, the Dred Scott decision lacked any warrant in the text, logic, structure, or original understanding of the Constitution,&#8221; Dr. George wrote four years ago at <a href="https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2016/01/a-republic-if-you-can-keep-it">First Things</a>. &#8220;It was, as Abraham Lincoln rightly insisted, an act of judicial will, not law, and as such an assault on the very Constitution in whose name the justices purported to act. Dred Scott, like Roe v. Wade, was a case of judicial usurpation in the cause of mass dehumanization.&#8221;
It is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/walsh-president-trump-will-be-the-first-president-to-attend-the-march-for-life-heres-why-that-matters">wonderful</a> that President Donald Trump spoke today to the March for Life. But to oppose abortion yet support judicial supremacy — the notion that the Supreme Court does not merely render judgments for discrete litigants in a given <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleiii">Article III</a> &#8220;case&#8221; or &#8220;controversy,&#8221; but is the exclusive and final arbiter of broader legal/political principle for the nation — is not to oppose abortion at all. It is self-contradictory and nonsensical. President Trump would do well to<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer"> follow the lead</a> of his predecessor Abraham Lincoln, who issued the following famous remarks as part of his magisterial <a href="http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/lincoln1.asp">First Inaugural Address</a> (emphasis my own):
<blockquote>I do not forget the position assumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court, nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding in any case upon the parties to a suit as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other departments of the Government. And while it is obviously possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chance that it may be overruled and never become a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice. At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.</blockquote>
Roe is not merely a human rights tragedy of unfathomable scale. It is also a bastardization of our entire system of self-governance. It is a bastardization of the republicanism upon which the nation was founded. And it deserves to be treated with no more dignity than the righteous irreverence with which Lincoln treated Dred Scott.

Demonstrators Participate In The March For Life Pro-Life Rally

HAMMER: Abortion Is A Grave Injustice. We Must Treat Roe Just Like Dred Scott.

Fourteenth Amendment

March For Life

Morality

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Roe v. Wade is the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/jacobs-why-the-u-s-supreme-court-needs-to-recognize-fetal-rights">essence of science denial</a>, and it has been for nearly 50 years. Yet the 2020 Democratic Party presidential candidates share a vision of America that centers around Roe and its long-debunked scientific notions about human biology.
Ever since the first Democratic presidential debates, the candidates have increasingly asserted their fervent belief in Roe v. Wade — a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-yes-alabama-legislature-right-openly-defy-josh-hammer">fallacious decision</a> that is based upon and perpetuates erroneous and obsolete ideas that contradict the fundamental, objective scientific facts of the biological science of human embryology. The most egregious, blatant, and disingenuous of all Roe&#8216;s distortions is its central tenet that it remains a mystery when human life begins.
More, in order to completely obscure the biological truth and redefine human reproduction to satisfy their political point of view, the politicians have announced numerous policies to augment Roe, including the promise to codify this toxic source of misinformation about human development.
Roe v. Wade declares: “We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man&#8217;s knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer.”
Since when should those in “medicine, philosophy, and theology” be consulted for such a specifically biological issue when they have no such academic expertise? Most philosophers and theologians have never had a graduate course in biology, much less in human embryology, and most physicians briefly learn about human embryology as part of a broader anatomy course and are not properly considered “scientists.” Human embryology is the study of development of the new individual from beginning to end and is the only science that specializes in when a human life starts; solely the testimonies of those biologists with doctoral degrees in human embryology should, in theory, be consulted. Yet not one human embryologist was allowed to testify during the Roe litigation.
In addition, to help rationalize the decision to reject the concept of “personhood” of the human embryo and fetus until “viability,” cited at the time to be between 24 and 28 weeks, Roe refers to ancient scientific ideas about human reproduction when it claims: “There has always been strong support for the view that life does not begin until live birth. This was the belief of the Stoics.”
The Stoics were a group of Greek philosophers, existing around 300 B.C.E. Are the Democratic presidential candidates endorsing the suggestion that human biology has not advanced for more than 2000 years — and that it will never do so?
Among the scientific experts, there is and has long been an international consensus regarding the beginning of a human life. When a human being — an individual, living member of the human species — begins to exist has been known and documented for more than 100 years and was instituted in 1942 in the Carnegie Stages of Human Embryonic Development. The Carnegie Stages continue to be refined and advanced as the global standard of human embryological research, and <a href="https://www.medicalmuseum.mil/assets/documents/collections/hdac/stage01.pdf">Carnegie Stage 1</a> still documents human sexual reproduction.
Carnegie Stage 1 states that all sexually reproduced human beings begin to exist at the start of the process of fertilization (Carnegie Stage 1a). Human embryologists know that fertilization also initiates the continuum of human life — in other words, after fertilization, the new human being does not become a different kind of thing. He or she continues to grow and develop as the same human organism throughout the rest of the embryonic period, the fetal period, and then after birth, during the subsequent stages of life.
Thus, the term “human embryo” or “human fetus” is simply the scientific name for an already-existing human being during the embryonic or fetal period of human development. Thus, for sexually reproduced human beings, &#8220;personhood&#8221; begins at fertilization, not at “viability,” “first breath,” or some later point that conveniently fits a popular political, social, or economic narrative.
Under the Supreme Court’s current abortion jurisprudence precedent, as established in Roe v. Wade and modified/upheld in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, states are still prohibited from applying the objective scientific facts and banning abortion prior to “viability.” However, as medical technology has improved, Roe’s fetal “viability” threshold has moved back from 28 weeks — not forward to 40 weeks as imagined by the Democratic presidential hopefuls. In the U.S., infants born at 22 weeks gestation have a nearly 25% survival rate and in Japan, the survival rate is over 30%. In Sweden, for infants younger than 22 weeks gestation, the survival rate has improved from 3.6% to 20% over the last decade.
Rather than pledging allegiance to, expanding upon, and imposing their misconceptions and Roe v. Wade’s absurd “scientific” myths on the American people, the Democratic presidential candidates should acknowledge that the immediate product of human sexual reproduction is both a human being and a human person — and renounce public policies and laws that do not reflect this scientific reality.
&nbsp;
Brooke Stanton is the CEO of Contend Projects, a registered 501(c)(3) education organization spreading the basic, accurate scientific facts about when a human life starts and the biological science of human embryology.

Embryo at 7 weeks

STANTON: The Pro-Abortion Democrats And Their Unscientific Roe-volution

Last evening, on the 47th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court&#8217;s <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/bench-memos/roe-v-wade-ed-whelan/">infamous</a> Roe v. Wade decision, Daily Wire Editor-at-Large Josh Hammer, a constitutional attorney by training who has been a frequent proponent of both the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-what-alyssa-milano-gets-so-very-wrong-about-josh-hammer">immorality of abortion</a> and the need to overturn or <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-yes-alabama-legislature-right-openly-defy-josh-hammer">openly &#8220;defy&#8221;</a> a decision as patently erroneous as Roe, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-HnMAHs3-c">joined</a> “Tipping Point With Liz Wheeler” on One America News Network to make the straightforward constitutional argument for why Roe was indeed wrongly decided.
Hammer, a <a href="https://fedsoc.org/contributors/josh-hammer">Federalist Society campus speaker</a> who has a forthcoming piece of legal scholarship on the issue of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-conservatives-how-much-longer-are-you-josh-hammer">judicial supremacy</a>, argued in a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer">Daily Wire op-ed</a> one year ago that President Donald Trump would be on firm legal standing to outright &#8220;defy&#8221; lawless edicts such as Roe. Hammer contrasted the language of the little-known 1958 case of Cooper v. Aaron — in which the Court pronounced its judicial supremacist adherence to &#8220;the basic principle that the federal judiciary is supreme in the exposition of the law of the Constitution&#8221; — with the language from Abraham Lincoln’s <a href="http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/lincoln1.asp">First Inaugural Address</a>, in which Lincoln disavowed the legal and moral abomination of Dred Scott v. Sandford as a broader binding political principle:
<blockquote>I do not forget the position assumed by some that constitutional questions are to be decided by the Supreme Court, nor do I deny that such decisions must be binding in any case upon the parties to a suit as to the object of that suit, while they are also entitled to very high respect and consideration in all parallel cases by all other departments of the Government. And while it is obviously possible that such decision may be erroneous in any given case, still the evil effect following it, being limited to that particular case, with the chance that it may be overruled and never become a precedent for other cases, can better be borne than could the evils of a different practice. At the same time, the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.</blockquote>
For many social conservatives and constitutional originalists, Roe is the direct <a href="https://www.firstthings.com/article/2003/02/lincoln-on-judicial-despotism">legal and moral successor</a> to Dred Scott — and <a href="https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2016/01/a-republic-if-you-can-keep-it">ought to be treated</a> as such.
But before getting there, Hammer explained to Wheeler the basic 14th Amendment argument as to why Roe is, in fact, a wrongly decided decision whose unprecedented nationalization of abortion policy under thin constitutional guise amounted to a horrific judicial power grab:
<blockquote>Let&#8217;s talk about the actual constitutional law here. The 14th Amendment, Section 1 — it was a very famous constitutional amendment ratified in 1868, in the aftermath of the Civil War, intended as a civil rights provision largely for free blacks. The Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment says that &#8220;nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.&#8221; By the Due Process Clause&#8217;s plain text, it refers only to process — it does not refer to what lawyers would call &#8220;substance.&#8221;
Nonetheless, in 1965, in a case called Griswold v. Connecticut, the Supreme Court found that due to the &#8220;penumbras&#8221; and the &#8220;emanations&#8221; that come from the Fourth, Ninth, and 14th Amendments, there is a &#8220;right to privacy&#8221; in the Constitution. That is nonsense: There&#8217;s no such thing as a &#8220;right to privacy&#8221; anywhere whatsoever in the constitutional text. But from there, it was a pretty short step, eight years later after Griswold in 1973, for the Court to say that this &#8220;right to privacy&#8221; that they found means that you have a constitutional right to abort your unborn born child.
And it is a complete distortion and bastardization of the 14th Amendment. In my opinion, Roe v. Wade, Liz, is one of the two most constitutionally unsound and horrific decisions probably probably ever promulgated by the Supreme Court. &#8230; [It&#8217;s] right up there with the Dred Scott decision of 1857, which my hero of all heroes, Abraham Lincoln in his First Inaugural Address in 1861, famously said that he would not abide by. He respected it as applied to Dred Scott himself, but would not respect the ruling as it applied to anyone else in the country. And for years now, I&#8217;ve been preaching my [fellow] conservatives to adapt and adopt that principle as it applies to Roe itself.</blockquote>
WATCH:
<iframe title="The Legal Argument to Overturn Roe v. Wade" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/lBMCT8peHGE?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Hammer OANN 1.22.20

WATCH: Hammer On ‘Tipping Point With Liz Wheeler’: The Legal Argument To Overturn Roe

On Wednesday, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-senator-josh-hawley-most-important-freshman-josh-hammer">ascendant</a> freshman Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) had some particularly harsh words for the way House Democratic impeachment managers comported themselves thus far during the Senate&#8217;s nascent impeachment trial.
&#8220;#ImpeachmentTrial Day 1 = epic fail for House managers,&#8221; Hawley tweeted. &#8220;Used 13 h[ou]rs to grandstand, repeatedly taking rebuttal time just to delay. Attacked senators. Alienated their audience. Admonished by the Chief Justice for unprofessionalism. If this is best they can do, should just stop now.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ImpeachmentTrial?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ImpeachmentTrial</a> Day 1 = epic fail for House managers. Used 13 hrs to grandstand, repeatedly taking rebuttal time just to delay. Attacked senators. Alienated their audience. Admonished by the Chief Justice for unprofessionalism. If this is best they can do, should just stop now
&mdash; Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) <a href="https://twitter.com/HawleyMO/status/1220033771086458880?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 22, 2020</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
But Hawley, a formerly prolific constitutional attorney and Missouri attorney general who once served as a law clerk on the U.S. Supreme Court for Chief Justice John Roberts, also had some strong words to describe the Democratic antics that precipitated his former boss&#8217;s remarkable rebuke, in the wee hours of the morning, of the rambunctious trial he saw unfolding before him.
As The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/chief-justice-roberts-finally-the-umpire-he-wanted-to-be-criticizes-both-sides-of-impeachment-trial">reported</a> earlier today, Roberts reprimanded what he deemed the overly fraught and puerile behavior of the dueling parties:
<blockquote>“It is appropriate at this point for me to admonish both the House managers and the president’s counsel in equal terms to remember that they are addressing the world’s greatest deliberative body,” Roberts sternly rebuked. “One reason it has earned that title is because its members avoid speaking in a manner, and using language, that is not conducive to civil discourse.”
“In the 1905 [Judge Charles] Swayne [impeachment] trial, a senator objected when one of the managers used the word ‘pettifogging’ — and the presiding officer said the word ought not to have been used,” the chief justice continued. “I don’t think we need to aspire to that high a standard, but I do think those addressing the Senate should remember where they are.”</blockquote>
The chief justice&#8217;s excoriation took Hawley aback: As Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/hawley-calls-chief-justice-roberts-admonishment-at-impeachment-trial-extraordinary">reports</a>, Hawley said he has &#8220;never heard [Roberts] deliver an admonishment like that from the bench ever.&#8221;
&#8220;He chooses his words very very carefully,&#8221; Hawley continued, according to Fox News. &#8220;He cited a 1905 case impeachment case in which &#8230; one of the sides was &#8230; using language that was thought to be inappropriate. And so while he was careful to &#8230; I think &#8230; to be even-handed about it as is appropriate judicially, it&#8217;s very clear what the impetus for that was &#8230; [Rep. Jerry] Nadler [(D-NY)] getting up and calling the president&#8217;s counsel a bunch of liars.&#8221;
&#8220;I mean, that&#8217;s an extraordinary thing to say on the floor the United States Senate the middle of the trial and that&#8217;s what drew the rebuke [from Roberts] and rightly so,&#8221; Hawley concluded. &#8220;I can tell you, there was an open, open gasping on the Senate floor when Nadler was saying these things.&#8221;
Chief Justice Roberts, a George W. Bush high court nominee who is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-have-issues-john-josh-hammer">widely reputed to care tremendously</a> about preserving the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer">purported</a> non-politicization of Alexander Hamilton’s <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed78.asp">“least dangerous”</a> branch, famously analogized the role of a Supreme Court justice to that of a baseball home plate umpire calling balls and strikes during his Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing.
&#8220;[T]his time, [Roberts] really is just the umpire,&#8221; Politico <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/01/20/john-roberts-trump-impeachment-101114">observed</a> earlier this week. &#8220;He’s not the one we’re tuning in to see, and the game’s most important decisions and actions belong to other people. And the rulings he makes, for once, can be made under an umpire’s decision-making conditions: All by himself, yes or no, and maybe in real time.&#8221;

Josh Hawley

Josh Hawley: Chief Justice’s Impeachment Criticism In Response To ‘Extraordinary’ Democratic Antics

Impeachment

U.S. Senate

The U.S. Supreme Court this morning heard oral argument in the crucial First Amendment religious liberty case of Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue. The legal issue, as framed by <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/espinoza-v-montana-department-of-revenue/">SCOTUSblog</a>, is &#8220;[w]hether it violates the religion clauses or the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution to invalidate a generally available and religiously neutral student-aid program simply because the program affords students the choice of attending religious schools.&#8221;
Amy Howe of SCOTUSblog <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2020/01/argument-preview-justices-to-consider-dispute-over-tax-credits-for-scholarships/">contextualizes the importance</a> of Espinoza through the prism of the Court&#8217;s recent First Amendment religious liberty jurisprudence:
<blockquote>Two and a half years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that Missouri’s policy of excluding churches from a program to provide grants to resurface playgrounds violated the Constitution. In a footnote in their opinion in <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/trinity-lutheran-church-of-columbia-inc-v-pauley/">Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer</a>, the justices emphasized that their decision was limited to the facts before them and did “not address religious uses of funding or other forms of discrimination.” [In Espinoza], the justices will return to the question they left open in Trinity Lutheran, when they review a decision by the Montana Supreme Court invalidating a tax-credit program because the scholarships created by the program could be used at religious schools.</blockquote>
The Montana state constitutional provision challenged in Espinoza is a so-called &#8220;Blaine Amendment&#8221; — an unfortunate area of law that has its insidious origins in blatant anti-Catholic bigotry. <a href="https://firstliberty.org">First Liberty Institute</a>&#8216;s Jeremy Dys explained the sordid history yesterday in a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dys-its-time-to-end-the-bigotry-of-blaine-amendments">Daily Wire op-ed</a> calling for the Court to end &#8220;Blaine Amendments&#8221; once and for all:
<blockquote>In 1875, &#8230; [James] Blaine introduced a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that would prevent any government aid to “sectarian schools,” targeting Catholic schools in particular.
His federal amendment failed, but various states borrowed his proposal and their own constitutions were amended instead. Today, almost 40 states have a constitutional provision that prevents government aid to religious institutions. These state constitutional amendments have empowered states to legally discriminate against religious organizations when they perform the same work secular institutions do.
For years, activists have used Blaine Amendments to successfully exclude religious individuals and organizations from benefitting from public benefits. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote of Blaine Amendments in the 2000 decision of <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/530/793/">Mitchell v. Helms</a>, “This doctrine, born of bigotry, should be buried now.”</blockquote>
Ilya Shapiro, who filed a “<a href="https://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/files/2019-09/Espinoza-merits.pdf">friend of the court brief</a>” on behalf of Cato Institute&#8217;s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies, is optimistic that the Court will do precisely what Justice Thomas called for it to do in Mitchell. Speaking exclusively with The Daily Wire, Shapiro opined: &#8220;The Supreme Court has the opportunity here to remove the last legal barrier to school choice, and I think it’s poised to do so. Constitutional principles of free exercise and equal protection don’t allow Montana to exclude religious groups from public benefits solely because of their religious nature. Similarly, there’s no room in Supreme Court precedent to exclude religious schools from programs structured around private choice (as opposed to, say, direct taxpayer funding of devotional education).&#8221;
In an additional <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/slugh-jewish-groups-must-support-ending-the-bigotry-of-blaine-amendments">Daily Wire op-ed</a> published this morning, <a href="https://www.jcrl.org/">Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty</a> (JCRL) General Counsel Howard Slugh also lambasted the bigotry of Blaine&#8217;s legacy. &#8220;Espinoza has a strong legal basis for her claims,&#8221; Slugh wrote. &#8220;The Supreme Court recently <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-577_khlp.pdf">indicated</a> [in Trinity Lutheran] that excluding a religious organization &#8216;from a public benefit for which it is otherwise qualified, solely&#8217; because it is religious &#8216;is odious to our Constitution … and cannot stand.&#8217; The Supreme Court should strike down Montana’s Blaine Amendment based on the same reasoning.&#8221;
Slugh, who filed a “<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/116233/20190918141339707_No18-1195JRCL.pdf?fbclid=IwAR2-39Qgpp2Hc2MEbPaRhiXeeFVGOgNpEWF0_5AMTEa6onbe90Xbsc5_yzU">friend of the court brief</a>” on behalf of JCRL, was in attendance this morning at the Supreme Court oral argument. Speaking exclusively with The Daily Wire, Slugh described what he saw: &#8220;I was very pleased with how the oral argument went. It seemed that at least five justices understood that the key issue in this case is whether it was permissible for the Montana Supreme Court to act pursuant to a law that, on its face, requires discrimination against religious people without even considering whether such discrimination is permissible under the U.S. Constitution. The answer to that question is that it is not permissible, and at least five justices seemed to support that position.&#8221;
Proponents of religious liberty and school choice ought to hope that Slugh&#8217;s intuition proves prescient.

The U.S. Supreme Court Building

Supreme Court Hears Blockbuster Case On Religious School Choice

Education

First Amendment

Religion

School Choice

After the clock struck midnight on the East Coast last night, toward the final hours of the marathon U.S. Senate impeachment trial session that featured both the U.S. House manager prosecution and the presidential defense team dueling about the trial&#8217;s procedural rules, Chief Justice John Roberts was peeved. The nation&#8217;s highest jurist, <a href="https://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/articles/1/essays/17/trial-of-impeachment">constitutionally required</a> to preside over a Senate impeachment trial of a president, excoriated both sides for the rambunctiousness and juvenility of their respective rhetoric.
&#8220;A marathon, 12-hour first day in the Senate impeachment trial against President Trump erupted into a shouting match well after midnight Wednesday morning, as Trump&#8217;s legal team unloaded on Democratic impeachment manager Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-(NY) — in an exchange that prompted a bleary-eyed Chief Justice John Roberts to sternly admonish both sides for misconduct in the chamber,&#8221; Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/senate-impeachment-trial-begins-with-win-for-the-white-house-as-dems-rules-proposal-is-nixed">reported</a>.
&#8220;Nadler, who was overheard apparently planning to impeach Trump back in 2018, said it would be a &#8216;treacherous vote&#8217; and a &#8216;cover-up&#8217; for Republicans to reject the [former National Security Advisor John] Bolton subpoena amendment, claiming that &#8216;only guilty people try to hide evidence,'&#8221; the outlet continued. &#8220;Bolton has reportedly described Trump&#8217;s conduct as akin to a &#8216;drug deal,&#8217; and he has indicated he would be willing to testify and provide relevant information.&#8221;
President Trump&#8217;s two main defense lawyers, White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and Jay Sekulow, both fired back against Nadler. &#8220;Mr. Nadler came up here and made false allegations against our team,&#8221; Cipollone said. &#8220;He made false allegations against all of you [senators]; he accused you of a cover-up. He&#8217;s been making false allegations against the president. The only one who should be embarrassed, Mr. Nadler is you, for the way you&#8217;ve addressed the United States Senate. This is the United States Senate. You&#8217;re not in charge here. &#8230; It’s about time we bring this power trip in for a landing.&#8221;
This exchange proved too much for the chief justice.
&#8220;It is appropriate at this point for me to admonish both the House managers and the president&#8217;s counsel in equal terms to remember that they are addressing the world&#8217;s greatest deliberative body,&#8221; Roberts sternly rebuked. &#8220;One reason it has earned that title is because its members avoid speaking in a manner, and using language, that is not conducive to civil discourse.&#8221;
&#8220;In the 1905 [Judge Charles] Swayne [impeachment] trial, a senator objected when one of the managers used the word &#8216;pettifogging&#8217; — and the presiding officer said the word ought not to have been used,&#8221; the chief justice continued. &#8220;I don&#8217;t think we need to aspire to that high a standard, but I do think those addressing the Senate should remember where they are.&#8221;
That the chief justice saw fit to reprimand both sides did not sit well with every Republican senator in the &#8220;world&#8217;s greatest deliberative body.&#8221; Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), himself a lawyer and former U.S. Supreme Court law clerk for Justice Samuel Alito, <a href="https://video.foxnews.com/v/6125557687001#sp=show-clips">told Fox News</a> earlier today that he thought it was &#8220;unfair&#8221; for Roberts to include Trump&#8217;s defense lawyers alongside the Democratic prosecution as part of his critical remarks.
Chief Justice Roberts, a George W. Bush high court nominee who is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-have-issues-john-josh-hammer">widely reputed to care tremendously</a> about preserving the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-it-past-time-trump-openly-defy-court-order-josh-hammer">purported</a> non-politicization of Alexander Hamilton&#8217;s <a href="https://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed78.asp">&#8220;least dangerous&#8221;</a> branch, famously analogized the role of a Supreme Court justice to that of a baseball home plate umpire calling balls and strikes during his Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing. Politico <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/01/20/john-roberts-trump-impeachment-101114">recently observed</a> how his role overseeing the nation&#8217;s first presidential impeachment trial in two-plus decades could afford him a unique opportunity to bring that analogy to fruition:
<blockquote>[I]n his 14 years as chief justice, Roberts hasn’t really had the role of umpire — and he knows it. That said, Roberts’s comment about balls and strikes probably reflected an aspiration. To the extent that the Court can be perceived (rightly or wrongly) as acting with principled neutrality, its reputation as an arbiter floating above the political scrum is strengthened. And for judges who like to be perceived as doing nothing more than faithfully applying the law, the umpire analogy is always tempting. There’s something appealing about just getting to call balls and strikes.
Now for the first time, the impeachment trial is giving Roberts that chance. For once, Roberts will have a decision-making role in a forum where he himself is not a major player in the drama. The big players are people like McConnell and Schumer, Romney and Murkowski, Nadler and Schiff, Starr and Dershowitz, the witnesses (if any) who testify—and, offstage, the president. Roberts is there, at the center, and he needs to make decisions. But this time, he really is just the umpire. He’s not the one we’re tuning in to see, and the game’s most important decisions and actions belong to other people. And the rulings he makes, for once, can be made under an umpire’s decision-making conditions: All by himself, yes or no, and maybe in real time.
</blockquote>
Roberts, the infamous deciding vote in favor of constitutionally upholding Obamacare&#8217;s individual mandate back in 2012, has long drawn the ire of many conservative critics. Last summer, I opined in a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-have-issues-john-josh-hammer">Daily Wire op-ed</a> about the lessons conservatives should learn from his oftentimes lackluster career on the nation&#8217;s highest court:
<blockquote>
The lessons to learn from Roberts’ tremendously disappointing career on the Court are the same <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/47351/hammer-draw-right-lessons-kavanaughs-bad-start-no-josh-hammer" data-reader-unique-id="67">lessons that conservatives ought to learn</a> from [Justice Brett] Kavanaugh’s similarly disappointing start. I have <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/44037/hammer-three-things-conservatives-must-look-future-josh-hammer" data-reader-unique-id="68">identified three broad criteria</a> for which we ought to carefully vet the next Supreme Court nominee: (1) full-spectrum conservatism, (2) stiff resistance to the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect_(United_States_Supreme_Court)" data-reader-unique-id="69">Greenhouse Effect</a>,” and (3) eagerness to aggressively correct course. And for the love of God, also make sure the nominee is also someone with a lengthy paper trail and who will not be tempted by non-legal concerns — such as Roberts’ obvious and indefensible preoccupation with the Court’s “institutional integrity.”
</blockquote>

Chief Justice Roberts, Finally The ‘Umpire’ He Wanted To Be, Criticizes Both Sides Of Impeachment Trial

Jerry Nadler

Republican Party

On January 22, 1973, Americans woke up to a different republic. At the will of seven unelected justices, Roe v. Wade made dramatically expanded abortion access both the policy and the law for our entire country. The opinion was an alarm bell, a warning that the moral dimension of our country had been irrevocably altered and would continue to change unless something stopped it. Speaking conservatively, 61 million babies have since been killed under this regime.
Every year since, pro-life Americans have come to Washington to express their hope and defiance at the March for Life. Two generations of pro-lifers have bent the arc of their lives toward undoing the injustice of abortion. I’m proud to be among them and to work for the most pro-life president in history. As pro-lifers gather in Washington once again in the fourth year of the president’s first term, it is worth taking stock of how President Trump has advanced the cause of life.
By any fair reckoning, we are in a golden chapter for our movement. President Trump has pushed the boundaries of the art of the possible further than ever. His appointment of constitutionally faithful jurists — 187 federal judges, including two associate justices of the Supreme Court, for overall over a fifth of all federal judgeships — will arrest the Left’s hold on the courts. One in four federal circuit court judges today have been appointed by President Trump.
Within weeks of taking office, President Trump did not just reinstate the Mexico City Policy to stop foreign aid from subsidizing organizations that perform abortions; he went even further, applying the policy to more funding streams and more foreign aid activities than has any other president. Last September, at the opening of the 74th United Nations General Assembly, he announced, “Global bureaucrats have no business attacking the sovereignty of nations that wish to protect innocent life,” making it clear to the world that our support for the sanctity of life doesn’t stop at the water’s edge.
President Trump prohibited Title X grantees from referring patients for elective abortions and prevented their physical co-location with abortion providers. As a result, Planned Parenthood quit the program, cutting off its access to hundreds of millions of dollars in taxpayer funding. He issued a robust conscience rule in order to ensure, among other things, that those who care for us when we are ill are not forced to perform or encourage abortion. Moreover, the president has just finalized a rule to stop insurers from quietly billing taxpayers for abortion services, ending an Obamacare loophole that left pro-life taxpayers unwitting accomplices to the violation of their conscience. He has also restricted the use of fetal tissue from elective abortions in government-funded medical research.
But the battle is not over. Policies like the Hyde Amendment, a bipartisan provision that has prevented federal funds from paying for abortion for more than four decades, are now suddenly under unprecedented attack. In the yearly funding process, we fought off attempts to overturn our administrative successes, and it was only through the president’s staunch opposition and the unwavering work of the life movement that we prevailed.
The urgency of our labors is often informed by the texture of our own lives. My daughter, Porter, suffers from cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder that shortens lives and requires expensive care. According to a Kaiser Permanente report, 87% of babies diagnosed with cystic fibrosis before birth are tragically aborted. These children are robbed of their lives and their parents miss out on the daily joy of loving their children, as we gratefully experience every day with Porter. Her life is a battle, but it is a glorious one, just like any other child growing up. So it is with our movement.
There is much work to be done to protect these gains and pursue others. President Trump will keep fighting in the months and years ahead for the cause of life and freedom for all Americans. And I am heartened to know that the president’s efforts will be joined by the hundreds of thousands of Americans from all walks of life who come each year in the cold to stand up and fight for our nation’s most vulnerable individuals, the unborn.
&nbsp;
Russ Vought is acting director of the White House Office of Management and Budget. Follow him on Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/russvought45">@RussVought45</a>.

U.S. President Donald Trump&#8217;s Third Year In The Oval Office

VOUGHT: The Most Pro-Life President In History

Planned Parenthood

Today, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/espinoza-v-montana-department-of-revenue/">Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue</a>. Kendra Espinoza challenged a state constitutional provision, known as a “<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dys-its-time-to-end-the-bigotry-of-blaine-amendments">Blaine Amendment</a>,” which requires the state to exclude religious schools from scholarship programs. Espinoza argues that she has a First Amendment right to use the scholarship funds to send her daughters to a religious school, so long as the school meets the program’s other requirements.
If Espinoza prevails, the impacts will extend beyond Montana. Thirty-seven other state constitutions contain similar Blaine Amendment-type provisions. Declaring these amendments unconstitutional could alleviate the burden that day school tuition imposes on many Jewish (and Christian) parents by allowing them to take advantage of school choice programs. Many Jewish communal organizations supported this result. But inexplicably, some Jewish groups opposed it. In light of such organizations’ opposition to a position that would benefit Jewish parents, American Jews should determine for themselves whether those group’s interests align with their own.
Espinoza has a strong legal basis for her claims. The Supreme Court recently<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-577_khlp.pdf"> indicated</a> that excluding a religious organization “from a public benefit for which it is otherwise qualified, solely” because it is religious “is odious to our Constitution &#8230; and cannot stand.” The Supreme Court should strike down Montana’s Blaine Amendment based on the same reasoning.
In light of the potential benefits. many Jewish organizations supported Espinoza’s position. The Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty (JCRL) — for whom I serve as general counsel — filed a “<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/116233/20190918141339707_No18-1195JRCL.pdf?fbclid=IwAR2-39Qgpp2Hc2MEbPaRhiXeeFVGOgNpEWF0_5AMTEa6onbe90Xbsc5_yzU">friend of the court brief</a>” highlighting the impact that this case might have for the Jewish community. JCRL explained the importance of religious schools to many Jewish families and the “Hobson’s choice” many Jewish parents face “between their financial security and their community’s religious continuity.” It highlighted the ways in which a positive ruling might lessen that burden — by increasing funding available to Jewish parents.
The JCRL was not alone in supporting Espinoza’s position. Agudath Israel submitted a<a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/120704/20191030001211377_Rev%20EFile%20Copy%20of%20No.%2018-1195%20CoS.pdf"> brief</a> indicating that “the constitutional principle that this case could establish &#8230; has great significance” for the Jewish community. The Orthodox Union (OU) joined a <a href="https://advocacy.ou.org/content/uploads/OU_EspinozavMontana_Amicus-brief.pdf">brief</a> explaining that “the overwhelming majority of [religiously observant Jews] choose to send their children to Jewish nonpublic schools,” and that a ruling for Espinoza would ensure the “equal treatment of all students in access to private education.” The executive vice president of the OU explained that a ruling in favor of Espinoza would “solidify the long-term beneficial impact” of many state aid programs that the organization has supported.
Unfortunately, not all Jewish communal organizations were in harmony. Organizations including the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), Men for Reform Judaism, the National Council of Jewish Women, The Central Conference of American Rabbis, and Women of Reform Judaism supported maintaining the Blaine Amendment. These groups <a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/122538/20191115111640255_18-1195bsacReligiousandCivil-RightsOrganizations.pdf">joined</a> a brief, which was also signed by Americans United for Separation of Church and State, that favored allowing discrimination against religious schools. It seems odd that such groups would support a law obligating states to discriminate against Jewish day schools, but they did.
The Montana Association of Rabbis (MAOR) filed its own <a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/122638/20191115160743194_Espinoza%20v.%20Montana%2018-1195%20Montana%20Rabbis%20amicus.pdf">brief</a> that presented the most troubling arguments for the other side. The Montana rabbis&#8217; brief preferences depriving its Christian neighbors of student aid funding over advocating for a religiously neutral position that would benefit Jewish parents. MAOR goes further than merely arguing that Montana may legally choose to discriminate against religious schools. It argues that Montana must discriminate against religious schools in order to avoid violating the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-bladensburg-cross-memorial-case-supreme-josh-hammer">First Amendment’s Establishment Clause</a>. If the Supreme Court were to accept this position, it would threaten state aid to religious schools, organizations, and individuals in every state — not merely those with Blaine Amendments.
MAOR argues that the Supreme Court should adopt its draconian and legally dubious position because “the demographics of Montana mean that the only religious schools eligible to benefit from the state’s tax-credit program are Christians.” This outcome would be true solely because of the demographics of Montana — there is no evidence that the program would ever intentionally discriminate in favor of Christian schools. In other states, non-Christian schools would clearly benefit. But the Montana rabbis would deny Jews nationwide this benefit in order to avoid benefiting Christians in Montana.
MAOR seems either not to realize or care that the ruling in this case will affect parents nationwide, including those in states with large Jewish populations and many Jewish schools. It is short-sighted, to say the least, to ask the Supreme Court to reinterpret the First Amendment to require states to discriminate against religious organizations simply to deprive Christian parents of a benefit in a single state.
Other groups, such as the ADL, joined a less extreme brief which argued the Supreme Court should reject “arguments for a right to funding of religious education on an equal basis with private secular education.&#8221; As a necessary result of this position, states would be allowed to discriminate against religious schools (and individuals) solely because of their faith even if they qualified for state funding in every other way. That brief approvingly cites a delegate to the Montana Constitutional Convention of 1889 who stated that “[i]f we cannot support our private schools, then it’s our own fault.” Suffice to say that many Jewish parents struggling to pay for their children’s tuition at a private Jewish school would likely disagree.
The Montana Association of Rabbis is free to make denying state benefits to Christians their primary concern. The ADL is welcome to adopt pursuing a secular public square and an impenetrable &#8220;wall of separation&#8221; between church and state as a goal. But American Jews should be aware of their motivations and should question how closely such groups can truly be said to represent their interests.
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Howard Slugh is the General Counsel of the <a href="https://www.jcrl.org">Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty</a>.
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dys-its-time-to-end-the-bigotry-of-blaine-amendments">It&#8217;s Time To End The Bigotry Of Blaine Amendments</a>
RELATED: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-at-dallas-jewish-monthly-religious-liberty-for-all-is-good-for-jews">Religious Liberty For All Is Good For Jews</a>

SLUGH: Jewish Groups Must Support Ending The Bigotry Of Blaine Amendments

James Gillespie Blaine led an interesting life. He served as speaker of the House of Representatives and in the United States Senate. Twice he served as secretary of state, holding the position under three separate presidents. He even sought the presidency, losing to Grover Cleveland.
Blaine’s most notorious legacy, however, is an amendment bearing his name.
Blaine got his idea from a fiery speech delivered by President Ulysses Grant at the height of a national controversy over whether religion had any place within the nation’s public schools. In 1875, President Grant declared, “Leave the matter of religion to the family altar, the church, and the private school, supported entirely by private contributions. Keep the church and state forever separate.”
Days later, Blaine introduced a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution that would prevent any government aid to “sectarian schools,” targeting Catholic schools in particular.
His federal amendment failed, but various states borrowed his proposal and their own constitutions were amended instead. Today, almost 40 states have a constitutional provision that prevents government aid to religious institutions. These state constitutional amendments have empowered states to legally discriminate against religious organizations when they perform the same work secular institutions do.
For years, activists have used Blaine Amendments to successfully exclude religious individuals and organizations from benefitting from public benefits. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote of Blaine Amendments in the 2000 decision of <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/530/793/">Mitchell v. Helms</a>, “This doctrine, born of bigotry, should be buried now.”
But Blaine’s legacy still lives. Just a few years ago, in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/16pdf/15-577_khlp.pdf">Trinity Lutheran Church of Columbia v. Comer</a>, many who hoped to attend the funeral of Blaine Amendments were disappointed when the Court stopped just short of killing Blaine. A frustrated Chief Justice John Roberts observed in the majority opinion that the Blaine Amendment at issue in Trinity Lutheran put the church to the choice of either operating as a church or “automatic and absolute exclusion from the benefits of a public program for which the [church] is otherwise fully qualified.”
How can that still stand in the year 2020? Place two organizations on equal footing — one of whom is charitably motivated because of its secularity and the other by its religious convictions. Yet only the secular organization qualifies for participation in public programs.
In fact, government officials need not rely upon the overall ability, educational or professional qualifications, financial stability, or facilities of a religious organization to decide whether it may participate. Rather, they may exclude religious organizations because they are religious organizations. Their religion may be the sole criterion for exclusion.
This week, the Supreme Court justices will have another crack at Blaine’s legacy. In <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/espinoza-v-montana-department-of-revenue/">Espinoza v. Montana Dept. of Revenue</a>, parents of young children challenge the state’s denial of the use of scholarship funds for their children to attend a religious school. The funds come from private donations for which individuals and/or organizations receive a tax credit. Montana contends this administrative act of government conceding taxes for charitable donations necessarily excludes the religious from participation.
First Liberty Institute, where I work, has experience with this. In fact, we have a good friend with more than a little personal experience. The state of Washington used its Blaine Amendment to deny Joshua Davey a promise scholarship that he intended to use to study for religious ministry at a religious college. His case went to the U.S. Supreme Court in 2004, where the court upheld Washington’s decision in <a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/540/712/">Locke v. Davey</a>.
But, Davey, inspired by the attorneys who helped him with his case, went to Harvard Law School instead and now has a thriving law practice in North Carolina. He partnered with First Liberty to draft a <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1195/116222/20190918134556011_18-1195%20Amicus%20Brief%20Forge.pdf">friend-of-the-court brief</a> in support of the Espinozas.
We argue on behalf of another client from Benton County, Washington, Forge Youth Mentoring. There, county officials ultimately decided not end their grant to Forge, which was among the only mentoring groups lending help to the troubled youth of their community. But that came only after First Liberty got involved. Otherwise, Blaine would have claimed yet another victim.
Religious organizations are as deserving of participation in public programs as anybody else. It was wrong for Blaine and his ilk to insist upon excluding Catholics from such participation in the 1800s. Insisting that we sanitize the public square of religious organizations merely begets a government intent on enforcing what Attorney General William Barr <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/jeremy-dys-liberal-attack-on-barrs-religious-freedom-speech-shows-hes-right">might refer to as</a> “militant secularism.”
Rather, the promise of the First Amendment is — at the very least — that government will be neutral towards religion. This welcomes religious organizations to compete in the public square on equal footing with other organizations. If they are to be denied, let it be for legitimate reasons having not the whiff of religious discrimination. Government should never tolerate the codification of religious bigotry.
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Jeremy Dys (<a href="https://twitter.com/jeremydys">@JeremyDys</a>) is Special Counsel for Litigation and Communications for First Liberty Institute, a non-profit law firm dedicated to defending religious freedom for all Americans. Read more at <a href="https://firstliberty.org">FirstLiberty.org</a>.

SCOTUS

DYS: It’s Time To End The Bigotry Of Blaine Amendments

Discrimination

In the soon-to-be-released documentary about U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, &#8220;Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words,&#8221; the jurist has some harsh words about former vice president and <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/who-will-win-democratic-primary-latest-2020-josh-hammer">current leading</a> 2020 Democratic Party presidential candidate Joe Biden. At the time of Thomas&#8217;s infamously raucous confirmation hearing before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, Biden, a Delaware Democrat, was the committee&#8217;s chairman.
Director Michael Pack, <a href="https://video.foxnews.com/v/6124958353001">speaking this morning</a> to Fox News host Steve Doocy on &#8220;Fox &amp; Friends,&#8221; described the much-anticipated documentary as a chance for viewers to &#8220;hear [Thomas&#8217;s] whole story&#8221; from the famously reticent justice himself. Pack noted that Justice Thomas and his wife Ginni are the only two people directly interviewed in the film.
Thomas, a black man who grew up in extreme poverty in Jim Crow-era Georgia, endured an extraordinarily nasty Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing following his nomination to the nation&#8217;s highest court by then-President George H.W. Bush. Thomas famously described the efforts to derail his nomination, in the aftermath of the public airing of allegations of sexual harassment by Anita Hill, as a &#8220;high-tech lynching.&#8221; Thomas is seen in the film&#8217;s trailer telling the camera: &#8220;We know what this is all about. This is the &#8216;wrong black guy.&#8217; Just say it.&#8221;
In December, The Daily Wire&#8217;s Amanda Prestigiacomo <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-trailer-for-new-clarence-thomas-documentary-drops-justice-says-liberals-worse-than-the-klan">highlighted</a> how, in the documentary, Thomas also claims that modern-day liberals have proved to be a bigger &#8220;impediment&#8221; for him throughout his meteoric rise than has the Ku Klux Klan itself:
<blockquote>“I felt as though, in my life, I had been looking at the wrong people as the people who would be problematic toward me,” Thomas reportedly says in the documentary, according to <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/justice-clarence-thomas-rebukes-biden-led-confirmation-hearings/story?id=67235780" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">ABC News.</a> “We were told that, ‘Oh, it’s gonna be the bigot in the pickup truck; it’s gonna be the Klansmen; it’s gonna be the rural sheriff.&#8217;”
“But it turned out that through all of that, ultimately the biggest impediment was the modern-day liberal,” the justice continued. “They were the ones who would discount all those things because they have one issue or because they have the power to caricature you.”</blockquote>
That Thomas excoriates Biden in the documentary has been previously reported. Earlier this month, The National Interest <a href="https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/we-watched-new-clarence-thomas-documentary-its-not-good-biden-113466">wrote</a> that, &#8220;[a]t one juncture of the film, Thomas was asked about a colloquy with Biden over natural law philosophy and the Constitution. Though he did not cite Biden by name, Thomas lamented that lawmakers do not seem to have full command of the subject matter during judicial confirmation hearings.&#8221;
In a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-2020-democratic-field-will-come-down-josh-hammer">Daily Wire op-ed</a> last March, I noted the leading role that Biden had similarly played in the <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2012/12/19/167645600/robert-borks-supreme-court-nomination-changed-everything-maybe-forever">vicious 1987 smearing</a> of then-U.S. Supreme Court nominee Judge Robert Bork:
<blockquote>Biden simply has too much baggage, in the current environment. Who in their right mind thinks that coquettish <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/joe-bidens-woman-touching-habit" data-reader-unique-id="48">creepy</a> “Uncle Joe” is a good fit for the current #MeToo moment? Who in their right mind thinks that Biden’s formerly held views on <a href="http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/03/joe-biden-record-on-busing-incarceration-racial-justice-democratic-primary-2020-explained.html" data-reader-unique-id="49">race</a> and <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/21/politics/joe-biden-criminal-justice/index.html" data-reader-unique-id="50">crime</a> won’t come back to destroy him in the minds of the increasingly dominant hard left faction of the Democratic base? Biden has simply been in the national spotlight for too long, and has too long a track record to cleanly avoid opposition research-driven scrutiny. And, amazingly, the man who once tag-teamed with Ted Kennedy to vilely <a href="https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/america-freer-with-bork-on-supreme-court/" data-reader-unique-id="51">savage Robert Bork’s</a> judicial career is almost assuredly now too “moderate” for the batcrap crazy hard Left.</blockquote>

Clarence Thomas Confirmation Hearing

Justice Clarence Thomas Blasts Joe Biden In Soon-To-Be Released Documentary

Fox News

Joe Biden

Four-time cancer survivor Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg revealed what she described simply as &#8220;good&#8221; news Tuesday: After undergoing radiation therapy in August to remove a malignant tumor, she remains &#8220;cancer free.&#8221;
The 86-year-old Justice offered the significant update on her health status during a &#8220;rare interview&#8221; with <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/08/politics/ruth-bader-ginsburg-civil-procedure/index.html">CNN</a> published Wednesday.
&#8220;I&#8217;m cancer free. That&#8217;s good,&#8221; Ginsburg told CNN Legal Analyst Joan Biskupic Tuesday. The popular progressive justice is starting off the year &#8220;sounding energized and speaking animatedly,&#8221; Biskupic stresses.
As Biskupic, a Supreme Court biographer, highlights, Ginsburg has repeatedly battled serious health issues in recent years, including multiple bouts with cancer.
&#8220;Last year at this time, Ginsburg was recovering from lung cancer surgery and missed several weeks at the court,&#8221; Biskupic points out. &#8220;She finished out the term in June. Soon after, she discovered a cancerous tumor on her pancreas, which was treated in August, and she resumed her active schedule.&#8221;
While Ginsburg chose to drop the notable health update during the interview with CNN, the real focus of the discussion was how &#8220;to limit the five conservative justices from setting new precedent over the dissent of the court&#8217;s four liberals,&#8221; as Biskupic puts it.
In its report on Ginsburg&#8217;s announcement of her cancer-free status, <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2020/01/08/ruth-bader-ginsburg-health-096302">Politico</a> provides some more details on the justice&#8217;s most recent battles with the disease, including that after being diagnosed with the malignant tumor in her pancreas over the summer, she underwent a three-week course of radiation therapy in August. Following the treatment, the Supreme Court issued a statement revealing that &#8220;there is no evidence of disease elsewhere in the body&#8221; and that no further treatment was necessary.
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Ginsburg&#8217;s health has been of particular concern over the past year, Politico notes, her bout with lung cancer requiring her to miss oral arguments last January &#8220;for the first time&#8221; in her decades-long career. The malignant nodes in her left lung were discovered because of a fall in which she damaged her ribs.
&#8220;She was hospitalized again just before last Thanksgiving with &#8216;chills and a fever,&#8217; but was released a day later,&#8221; Politico notes.
While Ginsburg&#8217;s health has raised alarms among progressives in recent years, Biskupic contends that the justice&#8217;s &#8220;iconic status today has only been enhanced by her resilience in surviving four cancer ordeals since 1999.&#8221;
Ginsburg has been in the news in recent months for multiple comments unrelated to her health, including slamming President Trump for calling on the Supreme Court to intervene in the Democratic Party’s impeachment campaign. &#8220;The president is not a lawyer,&#8221; Ginsburg told the BBC. &#8220;He’s not law-trained.&#8221;
But Ginsburg also <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-ruth-bader-ginsburg-halts-democrats-attempts-to-get-trump-financial-records">agreed</a> in early December to put a temporary administrative hold on Democrats’ efforts to gain access to Trump’s tax records, halting two subpoenas for his financial records.
The progressive justice has also made headlines over the last year for <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ruth-bader-ginsburg-says-what-conservatives-have-james-barrett">repeatedly praising</a> fellow justice Brett Kavanaugh, whose hyper-partisan confirmation process was marked by evidence-less accusations of past sexual misconduct.
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ruth-bader-ginsburg-says-what-conservatives-have-james-barrett">Ruth Bader Ginsburg Says What Conservatives Have Said About Kavanaugh All Along</a>
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Ruth Bader Ginsburg Gives ‘Good’ Update On Health After Recent Bout With Cancer

Cancer

A stirring new friend-of-the-court (&#8220;amicus&#8221;) <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1323/127140/20191231111040123_Prolife%20African%20American%20Organizations%20Amicus%20Brief%20TO%20FILE.pdf">brief</a> in a high-profile U.S. Supreme Court abortion case, filed on behalf of numerous &#8220;African American pro-life organizations,&#8221; powerfully argues that there is a &#8220;a long history involving unqualified and uncredentialed abortion providers disproportionately harming black women.&#8221;
The case, which has <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/legal-argument-louisiana-could-have-huge-josh-hammer">previously been covered</a> by The Daily Wire, is <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/june-medical-services-llc-v-gee-3/">June Medical Services, L.L.C. v. Gee</a>, and emanates out of the New Orleans-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. The case involves a Louisiana law that requires abortionists to have admitting privileges at a local hospital. The law was upheld by a divided Fifth Circuit panel. As described by <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/june-medical-services-llc-v-gee-3/">SCOTUSblog</a>, Gee presents the legal question of whether the statute &#8220;conflicts with the Supreme Court’s binding precedent in <a href="https://casetext.com/case/whole-womans-health-v-hellerstedt">Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt</a>.&#8221; In the 2016 Hellerstedt case, a divided Supreme Court deemed a similar statute in Texas to be unconstitutional.
Prominent black pro-life leaders who signed on to the <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/18-1323/127140/20191231111040123_Prolife%20African%20American%20Organizations%20Amicus%20Brief%20TO%20FILE.pdf">amicus brief</a> include Ryan Bomberger, Alveda King (the niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.), Dean Nelson, Catherine Davis, Stacy Washington, and numerous others. The brief&#8217;s argument summary opens with a bang:
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The struggle for racial equality is not over. The black community experiences a disproportionate share of abortions, often from doctors that do not have the same credentials as those who perform other forms of surgery. Until Act 620, Louisiana’s abortion clinics were exempt from the admitting privileges requirement that applies to other outpatient and ambulatory surgical centers in the state. This disparity is significant to black women, who make up the majority of abortion clinic patients and thus bear most of the known risks of abortion in Louisiana. These known risks are life-threatening to mothers.
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The brief continues to tear at the heartstrings by recalling the tragic stories of many black women who have died from abortion complications when they visited Kermit Gosnell-esque shoddy, un-credentialed, largely unregulated abortion clinics. &#8220;These gruesome deaths are part of a long history involving unqualified and uncredentialed abortion providers disproportionately harming black women,&#8221; the brief continued. &#8220;By requiring admitting privileges, [Louisiana] also created a means for reports about individual doctors to be checked against a national database — for the benefit of all patients, of all races, equally.&#8221;
As has been frequently noted by <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/eugenicists-abortion-group-director-says-the-quiet-part-out-loud-to-new-york-times-reporters">The Daily Wire</a>, Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, was an avowed eugenicist and racist. Sanger “was an out and proud eugenicist who described the poor and immigrants as ‘human weeds,’ ‘reckless breeders’ and ‘spawning … human beings who never should have been born’ in her book ‘Pivot of Civilization,&#8217;” <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-removes-poster-racist-margaret-sanger-paul-bois">The Daily Wire</a> has reported.
Sanger also <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/university-removes-poster-racist-margaret-sanger-paul-bois">wrote</a>: “The main objects of the Population Congress would be to apply a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring[;] to give certain dysgenic groups in our population their choice of segregation or sterilization.”
In a thunderous recent separate writing in the Fifth Circuit case of <a href="http://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/18/18-60868-CV0.pdf">Jackson Women&#8217;s Health Organization v. Dobbs</a>, Judge James C. Ho (for whom, in the interest of full disclosure, I previously served as a law clerk) <a href="http://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/18/18-60868-CV0.pdf">wrote at length</a> on the racist history of abortion advocacy in the United States (footnotes omitted):
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Eugenics—the concept of improving the human race through control of the reproductive process—has frequently been associated with explicitly racist viewpoints. “Many eugenicists believed that the distinction between the fit and the unfit could be drawn along racial lines.” Box v. Planned Parenthood of Ind. &amp; Ky., Inc., 139 S. Ct. 1780, 1785 (2019) (Thomas, J., concurring) (providing examples). Many eugenics programs, such as sterilization, explicitly targeted minorities—as the district court rightly acknowledged. Jackson Women’s Health Org., 349 F. Supp. 3d at 541 n.22 (noting that “Mississippi . . . sterilized six out of ten black women in Sunflower County at the local hospital—against their will”).
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“From the beginning, birth control and abortion were promoted as means of effectuating eugenics.” Box, 139 S. Ct. at 1787 (Thomas, J., concurring). See also id. (“[A]bortion is an act rife with the potential for eugenic manipulation.”); id. at 1788 (discussing Margaret Sanger’s view that birth control would help control the African American population); id. at 1789 (“Support for abortion can . . . be found throughout the literature on eugenics.”); DAVID T. BEITO &amp; LINDA ROYSTER BEITO, BLACK MAVERICK: T.R.M. HOWARD’S FIGHT FOR CIVIL RIGHTS AND ECONOMIC POWER 215 (2009) (noting that some African American civil rights leaders “fretted about the racist implications of abortion”). Indeed, among past abortion advocates were “some eugenicists [who] believed that abortion should be legal for the very purpose of promoting eugenics.” Box, 139 S. Ct. at 1789 (Thomas, J., concurring).
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Advocates of eugenics might well celebrate, then, that abortion “has proved to be a disturbingly effective tool for implementing the discriminatory preferences that undergird eugenics.” Id. at 1790–91 (Thomas, J., concurring) (providing examples). See also id. at 1791 (noting that the current “abortion ratio . . . among black women is nearly 3.5 times the ratio for white women”); William McGurn, White Supremacy and Abortion, WALL ST. J. (Sept. 24, 2019), https://www.wsj.com/articles/white-supremacy-and-abortion-11567460392 (discussing “why so many African-Americans, especially African-American women, have been leaders in the pro-life cause”); id. (“Catherine Davis of the Restoration Project . . . notes that the estimated 20 million black abortions since Roe v. Wade in 1973 are more than the entire African-American population in 1960.”).
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U.S. Supreme Court

Black Pro-Life Leaders To SCOTUS: ‘Long History’ Of ‘Uncredentialed Abortion Providers Disproportionately Harming Black Women’

Gosnell

Louisiana

There has to be a way to honor someone’s religious beliefs and respect members of the LGBT community at the same time. <a href="https://firstliberty.org/hensley/">Judge Dianne Hensley</a> thought she struck that balance. Instead, she received an official reprimand from the Texas State Commission on Judicial Conduct (“Commission”).
Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court decided Obergefell v. Hodges in 2015, public officials who are authorized (but not required) to officiate wedding ceremonies have faced the same dilemma Dianne faced. Many, rather than risk compromising their religious convictions, simply stopped officiating all weddings. But some demand that justices of the peace like Dianne either officiate all marriages or find themselves disqualified from office altogether.
Dianne knew there had to be another way. What if she were able to reconcile her religious beliefs with serving the needs of her community?
She knows that her convictions prevent her from officiating gay weddings, but she also respectfully understands that many of her gay friends do not share that same conviction. If she, like most of the justices of the peace in McLennan County, Texas, stopped officiating weddings altogether, it is those without ready access to low-cost alternatives who suffer most.
Instead, she found a way to honor her religious convictions and make sure any gay couple who wanted to get married could get married without delay or additional cost. Her referral system worked brilliantly.
If, because of schedule or moral reasons, Dianne could not officiate a requested wedding, she referred them to those who could — including a nearby walk-in wedding chapel. As soon as the couple holding a marriage license could make the three-block walk to the walk-in wedding chapel, they could be married.
It would cost the same, too. In fact, Judge Hensley offered to pay from her own pocket the difference between her rate and that of the walk-in wedding chapel. But the walk-in wedding chapel simply agreed to reduce its rate, instead, for those referred by Judge Hensley’s office.
It worked well. Dianne’s religious convictions remained undisturbed and her referral efforts accounted for more low-cost gay weddings than perhaps any other public official in all of McLennan County. But then, without having received a complaint, the Commission launched an investigation. Rather than praise her proactive problem solving, they determined she had to be reprimanded.
Dianne received a “Public Warning” for trying to honor her religious beliefs while respecting members of the gay community. It’s understandable why many have strong feelings about gay marriage, but surely we should be able to agree that justices of the peace like Dianne Hensley should not have their careers ruined for following both the rules of their faith and the law alike.
Surely in 2020, we can find a way to protect those with religious beliefs that prevent them from officiating weddings with which they morally disagree, while also accommodating the marriage of anyone lawfully allowed to wed. At the very least, no state agency should be punishing Dianne for her reasonable effort to reconcile her religious beliefs while meeting the needs of her community.
In fact, in a lawsuit we at First Liberty Institute filed in defense of Dianne, we argue that the Commission’s disciplinary actions violate the Texas Religious Freedom Restoration Act. There’s no compelling justification for the commissioners to punish a justice of the peace who, rather than cease officiating weddings entirely, accommodated more low-cost same-sex marriages than perhaps anyone in her entire local area.
Judge Hensley also hopes to continue using her referral system, even though she’s not required to officiate weddings at all. More than that, justices of the peace and other elected officials with the ability to officiate weddings are watching, hoping for a way to honor the distinctiveness of their faith while also respecting those in the gay community who wish to be married.
Is the only option really more reprimands? More penalties? More fines? Why must it either be officiate no weddings, officiate all weddings, or be disqualified from office because of your religious convictions, when there is a reasonable way to respect everyone involved?
Rather than punish her, the Commission ought to have recognized Dianne’s effort to balance her faith with the needs of her community — a type of basic, human, and much needed fairness missing in much of America today.
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Jeremy Dys (<a href="https://twitter.com/jeremydys">@JeremyDys</a>) is Special Counsel for Litigation and Communications for First Liberty Institute, a non-profit law firm dedicated to defending religious freedom for all Americans. Read more at <a href="https://firstliberty.org">FirstLiberty.org</a>.

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