CNN
—
Donald Trump’s return to power has sparked a reality-TV-like competition for attention among a group of black-clad candidates. Some of the candidates may hope to someday become Supreme Court justices.
Several potential candidates for one of the nine coveted seats on the high court are conservative, with public statements, combative court opinions and public champagne toasts. This effort could come in handy if a vacancy becomes available during President Trump’s second term.
For the next president, who has appointed provocative “fighters” to his Cabinet, appearing as an outspoken legal scholar is probably a wise strategy, but some Trump critics argue that this is not the case. is seen as an “unseemly” audition that breaks with tradition, especially when there are no judges. Vacancies that actually need to be filled.
U.S. Circuit Judge Andrew Oldham recently made headlines for condemning “political” prosecutions days after President Trump’s reelection. Although Mr. Oldham did not mention Mr. Trump by name or mention Special Counsel Jack Smith’s criminal case against Mr. Trump, the context of his remarks was hard to miss.
“The one thing that is beyond rational argument is that people should not be prosecuted based on their politics or their status as political candidates,” Oldham said at a conservative conference in Washington, D.C. This was announced at a bar convention sponsored by the Federalist Society.
Mr. Oldham, who was nominated by President Trump in 2018 to serve on the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, accused him of being “indicted in the middle of a political campaign” and said he needed a “solid defense” to oppose such efforts. He told the meeting that it was necessary.
The early maneuvering highlights the potential importance of President Trump’s second term to the federal judiciary, particularly the Supreme Court. If President Trump can nominate one or two young judges in his second term, he will lock in the conservative supermajority he built during his first term for decades.
“Some of the judges President Trump has put on appeals courts are openly campaigning for the Supreme Court,” said Jake Faleschini, judicial program director at the liberal Justice Alliance. .
“This is not something we’ve seen consistently in the past,” Fareschini said, noting that past candidates have often taken public stances to avoid giving negative material to critics during confirmation hearings. He pointed out that he was trying to limit the “We are in a different world.”
At the same Federalist Society convention where Oldham spoke earlier this month, Federal Circuit Judge Neomi Rao joined others to celebrate the Supreme Court’s decision earlier this year that weakened the powers of federal agencies. He and the panel members held up champagne.
Days earlier, another Trump appointee to the 5th Circuit, Circuit Judge James Ho, appeared to justify his position defending birthright citizenship, but this… It was a subtle shift in direction, one that brought it more in line with Trump’s own views on the issue. In an interview with a conservative law professor, Professor Ho said the citizenship principle does not apply in cases of “war” or “invasion.”
“Born citizenship clearly does not apply in cases of war or invasion,” Professor Ho told the professor. “To my knowledge, no one has ever claimed that the children of invading aliens have a right to birthright citizenship.”
Ho, who was an outspoken legal scholar long before President Trump was re-elected, framed his remarks as consistent with past positions. In an opinion this summer dealing with Texas’ construction of a floating barrier on the Rio Grande, Ho argued that Texas should have won the case because it was fighting off an “invasion” of immigrants. I wrote it.
“A sovereign is not sovereign unless it can protect itself from invasion,” he wrote.
Ho, Oldham and Rao, all in their late 40s to early 50s, could serve as justices for decades if selected and confirmed.
Despite appointing Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, it is unclear whether President Trump will have more opportunities to shape the jurors in his second term.
Retirement speculation has centered on two of the court’s leading and veteran conservatives, Justices Clarence Thomas, 76, and Samuel Alito, 74. A person close to Mr. Alito recently told The Wall Street Journal that he has no plans to resign.
Sources told CNN that Supreme Court nominees have not been actively vetted during President Trump’s transition, but emphasized that that could change quickly.
CNN has reached out to Oldham, Ho and Thapar for comment. A source close to Ho rejected the idea that the judge was eyeing a Supreme Court nomination, telling CNN that the judge may not want to move his family to the capital.
If Mr. Trump’s cabinet appointments are any indication, he may be looking for a thoroughly conservative judicial nominee closer to Mr. Thomas and Mr. Alito than his own first-term nominees. be.
John P. Collins Jr., a professor at the university, said Trump is “what some people would call a fearless judge, someone who argues and defends his positions and, in theory, criticizes them.” “We’re going to be looking for a judge who isn’t afraid to accept it.” George Washington University School of Law.
“All of Trump’s first-term appointments fit the mold of establishment legal conservatives,” Collins said. “Now they want more culture war-type conservatives.”
Hiram Sasser, general counsel for the conservative First Liberty Institute, rejected the idea that the judge himself was trying to court Trump’s attention. Instead, he said, influential judicial conservatives are likely to be asked to appear more on podcasts and forums rather than attracting attention themselves.
“People want to hear from the most productive and influential people in all walks of life,” Sasser said. “Based on President Trump’s past statements, I would expect him to be looking for judicial courage, someone who applies the law, even if the New York Times goes after him.” He wakes up the next morning and does it again. I don’t think he or his team are looking for Schmoozer.
If judges are engaging in a show of hands campaign, there are signs that it has worked in the past.
Then-Justice Gorsuch made headlines in 2016 for writing a concurring opinion for his majority opinion on the 10th Circuit, watering down the concept of giving federal agencies deference for regulatory approval in the face of ambiguous laws. Collected. This view dovetailed neatly with Trump’s own positions on limiting the power and size of government.
“There is an elephant in the room for us today,” Gorsuch wrote about the so-called Chevron homage months before the 2016 election. “Perhaps the time has come to face the behemoth.”
The Supreme Court ultimately overturned Chevron’s support with the Gorsuch majority in a blockbuster decision earlier this year, leading to the toast of the Federalist Society.
U.S. Circuit Judge Amr Thapar, another jurist often mentioned as a potential Supreme Court candidate, recently used a Heritage Foundation event to talk conservatives into ruling on everything from abortion to gun cases. He criticized law schools for not teaching originalism, a legal theory supported by judges.
Tapper, who was appointed by President Trump to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2017, called U.S. law schools “in the wrong” and criticized conservative principles that rely on defining the text of the Constitution as He accused the government of “medical malpractice” for not accepting the situation more forcefully. The framers would have understood. Thapar, 55, said universities that fail on this front should face the consequences in terms of funding.
“If that’s not a priority, taxpayers should take heed and demand change,” Thapar said. “All of us, including taxpayers, should demand that law schools hire professors who are dedicated to educating people about the meaning of the Constitution, not what the professor wants it to mean.”
