Kamala Harris announces she is co-proposing Biden plan to shake up Supreme Court: ‘No one is above the law’
WASHINGTON — President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday together proposed a long-shot plan to remake the Supreme Court — which Republicans denounced as politicizing the legal system.
“President Biden and I are calling on Congress to pass important reforms – from imposing term limits for Justices’ active service, to requiring Justices to comply with binding ethics rules just like every other federal judge,” Harris said in a statement.
“These popular reforms will help to restore confidence in the Court, strengthen our democracy, and ensure no one is above the law.”
The proposals include an 18-year term limit and requirements that justices disclose gifts, avoid political activity and recuse themselves over conflicts of interest. They also pitched a constitutional amendment that would rescind the Supreme Court’s July finding that presidents have presumed immunity for the core functions of their office.
Harris, 59, claimed credit for helping formulate the plan despite holding no public events to promote the package as she began her second week as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
The 81-year-old president, who dropped his presidential bid eight days ago and endorsed Harris as his successor, traveled to Austin, Texas, to discuss the plan at the LBJ Presidential Library.
Four Biden proposals to remake the Supreme Court and backed by Harris:
- The Supreme Court justices would be limited to 18 years on the bench.
- Presidents could only nominate one justice every two years.
- A new ethics code would require justices to disclose gifts, not engage in political activities and avoid conflicts of interest involving themselves or their spouses.
- A constitutional amendment would reverse the court’s ruling that presidents have immunity for their actions in office.
“I’ve made clear how I feel about Kamala and she’s been an incredible partner to me and a champion of surprise throughout her career,” Biden said in his speech.
“And she’ll continue to be an inspiring leader and project the very idea of America — the very idea that we’re all created equal and deserve to be treated equally throughout our lives.”
The bundle of ideas was immediately discounted by most politicians and pundits as a messaging stunt rather than a true legislative attempt during the lame-duck phase of Biden’s presidency.
In a sign of how seriously the White House treated the plan’s prospects, key Democrats who would be in charge of drafting the actual bills and shepherding them through committee were not briefed ahead of time on the details, Axios reported.
The package serves primarily to publicize criticism of conservative justices — a base-rallying issue for Democrats — as well as to spur more focus on the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision ending federal abortion rights, an issue that Democrats effectively harnessed in that year’s midterm elections.
Harris has focused heavily on abortion rights in the early phase of her presidential candidacy.
Democrats have focused especially on blasting Justice Clarence Thomas, on the bench for nearly 33 years, who is married to conservative activist Ginni Thomas.
Thomas accepted free and undisclosed vacations from billionaire Harlan Crow, who had no known business before the court, yielding sustained Democratic criticism — even though Biden himself has failed to list free vacations on his annual ethics forms.
Democrats also have criticized conservative Justice Samuel Alito, who has been serving for more than 18 years, whose wife hanged an American flag upside down around the time of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said the bundle of reforms would not pass.
“President Biden’s proposal to radically overhaul the U.S. Supreme Court would tilt the balance of power and erode not only the rule of law, but the American people’s faith in our system of justice,” Johnson said Monday.
“This proposal is the logical conclusion to the Biden-Harris Administration and Congressional Democrats’ ongoing efforts to delegitimize the Supreme Court. Their calls to expand and pack the Court will soon resume. It is telling that Democrats want to change the system that has guided our nation since its founding simply because they disagree with some of the Court’s recent decisions. This dangerous gambit of the Biden-Harris Administration is dead on arrival in the House.”
