Category: Supreme Court

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Abortion Donald Trump Supreme Court

Trump Takes Credit For Texas Anti-Abortion Law And Sounds Like He Believes He’s Still POTUS

Now that the Supreme Court is finally ruling the way he wants them to, failed, one-term, twice-impeached former President Donald Trump is patting himself on the back so hard it’s a wonder he hasn’t dislocated his shoulder.

Speaking with Sharyl Attkisson of right-wing Sinclair Broadcasting, Trump beamed with pride as he took credit for the Supreme Court refusing to strike down the restrictive anti-abortion law that went into effect in Texas this week, remarking:

“We do have a Supreme Court that’s a lot different than it was. Before it was acting very strangely and I think probably not in the interest of our country.”

Keep in mind this is the very same Supreme Court that Trump chided with derision when they refused to take up any of the bogus election lawsuits filed by him and his allies when it became clear he had been badly beaten by President Joe Biden, tweeting in December of last year:

“This is a great and disgraceful miscarriage of justice. The people of the United States were cheated, and our Country disgraced. Never even given our day in Court!”

A month later, the loser former president was booted off Twitter permanently for his endless lies and conspiracy theories about the election.

While he was at it, Trump also told Attkisson that he was “studying” the high court’s ruling on the Texas abortion law:

“The ruling was very complex and also probably temporary. I think other things will happen and that will be the big deal and the big picture. So we’ll see what will happen. But we’re studying the ruling and we’re studying also what they’ve done in Texas.

“We’ll be announcing something over the next week or two weeks.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DXMB–vmM0&feature=emb_logo

Yeah, a guy who hates to read so much that his intelligence briefings had to be delivered with little more than charts and photos is going to be “studying” a Supreme Court ruling.

Be sure and catch the crap about “announcing” something over the next few weeks. This fool still thinks he’s president! Did he not get the memo? Does he think the White House has been moved to Florida and he’s still running the country? If so, it’s going to come as one hell of a surprise when he tries to board Air Force One and what’s waiting for him is one of his ancient jets with his name emblazoned on it. Provided, of course, he hasn’t had to sell all his planes to pay the loans that are coming due soon.

As usual, everything is all about Donald. That’s the way the world looks when you’re a delusional, addled old man who could well wind up spending the rest of his life in prison.

 

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Supreme Court

Jen Psaki Schools Male Reporter On ‘Choices’ After He Asks Absurd Question About Abortion

Less than 24 hours after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to strike down a restrictive Texas law which forbids nearly 85% of all abortions in the state, the Biden administration made it clear it will not sit by and allow women across the United States to be denied a right they are guaranteed under Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision handed down in 1973 which established that states may not seek to control a woman’s reproductive freedom.

President Joe Biden had this to say Thursday afternoon in an official statement:

“It unleashes unconstitutional chaos and empowers self-anointed enforcers to have devastating impacts,” Biden, a Democrat, said in a statement directing federal agencies to act to protect the right to abortion enshrined in the high court’s landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. “Complete strangers will now be empowered to inject themselves in the most private and personal health decisions faced by women.”

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki also commented on the ruling by the high court, noting:

“The effort and the focus of the federal government is to look for every resource, every level at our disposal to ensure that women in Texas have the ability to seek healthcare.”

That led Owen Jensen, the White House correspondent for EWNT — The Eternal Word Television Network — to ask:

“Why does the president support abortion when his own Catholic faith teaches abortion is morally wrong?”

Without a moment of hesitation, Psaki expertly swatted down Wilson by telling him:

“He believes that it is a woman’s right, a woman’s body, her choice. He believes it is up to a woman to make those decisions and make those decisions with her doctor. I know you have never faced those choices nor have you been pregnant. But for women out there who have faced those choices, this is an incredibly difficult thing in the president believes that their rights should be respected.”

Boom! Game, set, and match, Jen Psaki.

It shouldn’t be required to teach Americans that church and state are supposed to be kept separate under our form of government. It’s enshrined in the damn Constitution! As Thomas Jefferson himself once wrote:

“Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burned, tortured, fined and imprisoned. What has been the effect of this coercion? To make one half the world fools and the other half hypocrites; to support roguery and error all over the earth.”

The Texas attack on a woman’s right to choose will backfire on the state and on Republicans nationally. It may well hand the 2022 election to Democrats at the local, state, and national level.

When it comes to the right to choose, we should leave those decisions to the women who have to make them.

 

Categories
Supreme Court The Biden Administration

Justice Stephen Breyer Hints He’ll Retire So His Seat Doesn’t Go To A Right-Wing Judge

Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer turned 83 earlier this month, making him the oldest member of the U.S. Supreme Court, and based on remarks he made in an interview with The New York Times, it sounds like he’s ready to leave the high court so his replacement will be made by a Democratic president.

In the Times piece, which was written by Adam Liptak, Justice Breyer noted:

He recalled approvingly something Justice Antonin Scalia had told him.

He said, ‘I don’t want somebody appointed who will just reverse everything I’ve done for the last 25 years,’” Justice Breyer said during a wide-ranging interview on Thursday. “That will inevitably be in the psychology” of his decision, he said.

His replacement, it should be noted, would likely be an African-American woman, based on remarks President Joe Biden has made in the past, saying during the 2020 campaign for the White House:

“We talked about the Supreme Court — I’m looking forward to making sure there’s a black woman on the Supreme Court to make sure we in fact get everyone represented.”

Breyer also reacted favorably to a comment made by a late chief justice when it comes to whether retirement from the court was a judicial act and should be free of political considerations:

He was asked about a remark from Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who died in 2005, in response to a question about whether it was “inappropriate for a justice to take into account the party or politics of the sitting president when deciding whether to step down from the court.”

“No, it’s not inappropriate,” the former chief justice responded. “Deciding when to step down from the court is not a judicial act.”

That sounded correct to Justice Breyer. “That’s true,” he said.

All of this, Aaron Blake of the Washington Post suggests, sounds like Breyer is leaning toward announcing his retirement:

“In other words, if Breyer wants to be relatively certain he wouldn’t be replaced by someone ‘who will just reverse everything I’ve done for the last 25 years,’ time is of the essence. Sticking around could mean not just a 6-to-3 conservative court, but potentially a 7-to-2 one. He’s made clear that isn’t the only consideration, but it’s notable he’s talking about it in those terms and agrees it’s fair game for him to keep an eye on who’s going to replace him.”

Imagine how angry Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) will be if Breyer does indeed step down and allow Biden to name his successor. That makes the prospect of Breyer’s retirement even sweeter.

 

Categories
Crime Supreme Court WTF?!

Christian Group Tied To Amy Coney Barrett Faces Charges Of Sexually Molesting Children

A far-right Christian group with extensive ties to Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett has allegedly been allowing children to be sexually abused over the years and reportedly refused to punish the adults accused of committing the crimes.

The Washington Post reports that the group, known as “People of Praise,” is a offshoot of the “Christian movement of the early 1970s, which adopted practices described in the New Testament of the Bible, including speaking in tongues, the use of prophecy and faith healing.”

But all of their claims of piety hid a darker secret which came to light when Katie Logan called the Eden Prairie, Minnesota Police Department to report a crime:

“Her high school physics teacher had sexually assaulted her two decades earlier, she said. She was 17 and had just graduated from a school run by a small Christian group called People of Praise. He was 35 at the time, a widely admired teacher and girls’ basketball coach who lived in a People of Praise home for celibate men.”

Logan also told the dean of the school she attended of the abuse. The dean believed Logan and relayed her complaint to another official at the school.

But nothing happened, according to the Post, and the teacher remained as a staff member at the school:

“Dave Beskar remained at Trinity School at River Ridge until 2011, when he was hired to lead a charter school in Arizona. In 2015, he returned to the Minneapolis area to become headmaster of another Christian school. Beskar denies that any inappropriate sexual activity took place.”

Logan, who is now 37, says despite her warnings, People of Praise swept her complaint under the rug:

“People of Praise leaders failed me. I think they wanted to protect themselves more than they wanted to protect me and other girls.”

Members of a Facebook support group, “PoP Survivors” also allege they were abused by staffers at schools run by the religious organization:

“The Post interviewed nine people in the Facebook group — all but one of them women — who said they were sexually abused as children, as well as anotherman who says he was physically abused. In four of those cases, the people said the alleged abuse was reported to community leaders.”

Justice Barrett, it turns out, was raised in a People of Praise community in Louisiana and remains active in the South Bend, Indiana, branch of the group.

Though her involvement in the group never came up during her Supreme Court confirmation, Barrett was asked about her religious beliefs when she was nominated to the federal appeals court. She said then:

“It’s never appropriate for a judge to impose that judge’s personal convictions, whether they derive from faith or anywhere else, on the law.”

Men are in control of the decisions made inside People of Praise. The group is led by an all-male board of governors and husbands usually make all the decisions for their wives and children. Wives are not permitted to “take over” for the husbands when it comes to decision making.

Despite the allegations against members of the group, Craig Lent, chairman of the religious group’s board of governors, issued a statement which reads:

“People of Praise has always put the safety of children far above any reputational concerns.”

However, Lent refused to answer any written questions from the Post.

Categories
Joe Biden Supreme Court

Biden May Not Have To Wait Long To Appoint His First Supreme Court Justice

Ever since Donald Trump appointed Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court in the closing days of his presidency before losing the 2020 election to Joe Biden, many have wondered whether or not the high court is now tilted to the right for decades.

But based on a report from Politico, Biden may be appointing his first justice very soon, provided that one of the court’s most senior members decides to retire later this year:

“Justice Stephen Breyer is 82 and Democrats are a single Senate seat away from ceding control back to Republicans. It’s a familiar and uncomfortable bind for a party that barely nudged former Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to retire the last time they controlled both the Senate and the White House — then watched the Supreme Court veer to the right.”

No one is actively urging Breyer to step down from the court, but there are some in Congress who wonder if he wants his replacement to be appointed by a Democratic or Republican president, with Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) remarking:

“He is well familiar with the way judicial appointments work, and I believe strongly he has in mind the best interests of the country and will make the right decision. There are political realities that I hope judges will perceive.”

Another Democratic senator said it would be ideal if Breyer does decide to leave the court now while the Senate has a 50-50 split and Vice President Kamala Harris can make sure a replacement is confirmed:

“It’s self-evident that if you care at all about the balance of power on the Supreme Court then you have to not hang on until the very last moment. He should enjoy his retirement and allow us to put in a talented younger jurist that can serve for decades.”

While debate over whether or not Breyer would be wise to leave the court now continues, President Biden has made it clear that he’s open to the idea of expanding its membership from nine justices to several more, appointing a bipartisan commission to study what changes should be made to the highest court in the land. He has also made it clear that his first nominee will be a black woman, which would be a historic first.

Meanwhile, we’ll all just have to wait and see what Justice Breyer decides.