Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts took an "unmistakable" "swipe" this week at Vice-president-elect J.D. Vance, a Washington Post columnist opined Wednesday.
Roberts on New Year's Eve published his year-end report that one expert argued appeared to be more of a tongue-lashing at critics of the high court than a reasoned report. Roberts' report included a stern warning to reject “dangerous," "open disregard” for federal court rulings from both sides of the political spectrum. He also warned about the threat of violence and intimidation that judges across the country face, and of officials who defy their rulings.
On Wednesday, columnist Ruth Marcus noted that Roberts clearly jabbed Vance, writing that Roberts "took an unmistakable — and well-deserved — swipe at the vice president-elect over his reckless suggestions that it is sometimes acceptable to defy the rulings of federal courts."
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She highlighted Roberts' defense of judicial independence, which he said is "undermined" unless other branches of government enforce those decrees. Roberts cited prominent examples such as Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy standing behind judges following "massive local opposition" in response to the 1954 ruling in Brown v. Board of Education.
"Within the past few years, however, elected officials from across the political spectrum have raised the specter of open disregard for federal court rulings. These dangerous suggestions, however sporadic, must be soundly rejected," wrote Roberts.
Marcus remarked, "These words cannot be read in a vacuum — nor, I suspect, were they written in one." Her reasoning: no one has openly "toyed with defying court orders" as much as Vance — whose wife, Usha, once clerked for Roberts.
Vance in 2021 suggested Trump fire and replace "every single mid-level bureaucrat" and civil servant in the administrative state with MAGA supporters.
"And when the courts — because you will get taken to court — and when the courts stop you, stand before the country like Andrew Jackson did and say: ‘The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.'"
Marcus said a looming standoff between Trump and the courts is no longer theoretical.
"Trump’s contempt for the courts and the rule of law has long been evident. Now, he will have Vance by his side, seemingly ready to egg him on," wrote Marcus.
Should he lose a key case in the Supreme Court, she concluded, America needs to "brace for what Roberts might have to report a year from now."
