Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch said Americans should “be careful” regulating the judiciary—one of the first times the Trump-appointed justice has spoken about about President Joe Biden’s proposed reforms for the high court.
Gorsuch, who is currently in the middle of a press junket for his upcoming book, refused to comment directly on Biden’s proposed Supreme Court reforms, telling Fox News Sunday host Shannon Bream “I’m not going to get into what is now a political issue during a presidential election year. I don’t think that would be helpful.”
However, the usually tight-lipped justice did give Bream a stark warning about keeping the entire judicial system independent from government oversight.
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“I have one thought to add. It is that the independent judiciary—what does it mean to you as an American? It means that when you’re unpopular, you can get a fair hearing under the law and under the constitution,” Gorsuch said. “If you’re in the majority, you don’t need judges and juries to hear you and protect your rights. You’re popular. It’s there for the moments when the spotlight’s on you. When the government’s coming after you. And don’t you want a ferociously independent judge and a jury of your peers to make those decisions? Isn’t that your right as an American? And so I just say—be careful.”
The Supreme Court has come under increased scrutiny over the last year after reports of donors showering justices with lavish gifts and exotic vacations—or revelations that they benefitted from lucrative book deals.
The court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority after three justices were appointed by Trump, has also handed down a series of controversial opinions—including finding that the president has legal immunity for “official actions” taken while in office.
A majority of Americans now have a negative view of the high court, according to multiple polls, leading to record low approval ratings since 2022—the same year the court overturned Roe v. Wade. An AP/NORC poll released in June found that an astonishing 70% of respondents agreed that justices were “more likely to shape the law to fit their own ideologies.”
Last week, Biden announced a plan to reform the Supreme Court by introducing an enforceable ethics code and 18-year term limits for justices. In an op-ed published in the Washington Post, Biden also called for a “No One Is Above the Law” constitutional amendment that would likely overturn the Supreme Court’s decision to support presidential immunity decision.
The justices, who usually do not comment on the political process, have mostly remained silent since Biden’s announcement. However, before Biden’s announcement last Monday, liberal Justice Elena Kagan also called for similar ethics reforms at a judicial conference.
Kagan’s proposal would see the court’s already-existing ethics code enforced by an independent panel of judges appointed by the Chief Justice.
“The thing that can be criticized is: rules usually have enforcement mechanisms attached to them, and this set of rules does not,” Kagan said at the conference, according to the Washington Post. “However hard it is, we could and should try to figure out some mechanism for doing this.”
In another interview with New York Times columnist David French published on Sunday, Gorsuch also demurred when asked about the proposed reforms. He said that since Kagan proposed the idea of an ethics committee, “there’s been some developments in the world, and this is now a subject that’s being intensely discussed by the political branches, and I just don’t think it would be very useful for me to comment on that at the moment.”
When asked about term limits, Gorsuch again refused to answer. “David, I’m going to give you the same answer, OK? The only thing I’d add is that I look forward to a few years of fly fishing.”
