In his first major policy announcement since dropping out of the 2024 race, President Joe Biden has endorsed sweeping reforms to the Supreme Court.
On Monday, the White House issued a fact sheet noting that “recent ethics scandals involving some justices have caused the public to question the fairness and independence that are essential for the Court to faithfully carry out its mission to deliver justice for all Americans.”
Biden further endorsed the implementation of term limits for Supreme Court justices, as well as the creation of a binding code of ethics “that require justices to disclose gifts, refrain from public political activity, and recuse themselves from cases in which they or their spouses have financial or other conflicts of interest.”
The president also called on Congress to overturn the Supreme Court’s recent presidential immunity ruling, designed to help shield former President Donald Trump from accountability for his alleged crimes, and pass a constitutional amendment stating that “the Constitution does not confer any immunity from federal criminal indictment, trial, conviction, or sentencing by virtue of previously serving as president.”
The president accompanied his announcement with an op-ed in The Washington Post laying out his reasoning for the proposed reforms.
“On top of dangerous and extreme decisions that overturn settled legal precedents — including Roe v. Wade — the court is mired in a crisis of ethics,” Biden wrote. “We can and must prevent the abuse of presidential power. We can and must restore the public’s faith in the Supreme Court. We can and must strengthen the guardrails of democracy.”
Vice Present Kamala Harris, who is expected to replace Biden as the head of the 2024 Democratic ticket, endorsed the proposals on Monday, writing in a statement that the reforms “will help to restore confidence in the court, strengthen our democracy, and ensure no one is above the law.”
“President Biden is right to lay out an ambitious plan that provides a blueprint to repair and strengthen our democracy, which continues to be weakened by the unchecked corruption, partisanship, and lawlessness exhibited by the Supreme Court’s right-wing justices,” Alex Aronson, executive director at Court Accountability, tells Rolling Stone.“This announcement should also prompt Congress to exercise its constitutional authority to investigate judicial corruption and abuse of power. Only through sustained and rigorous oversight can we have confidence that the court’s decisions are based on law, not the wishes of outside interests.”
Senior Democratic lawmakers have been demanding comprehensive Supreme Court reform legislation for years. Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), majority whip and chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) called for the passage of the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency Act earlier this year.
The Biden White House has chosen to commit to the issue relatively late: While the president empaneled a commission to study potential Supreme Court reforms in 2021, he did nothing with the court’s findings — even as the court’s conservative supermajority issued a series of controversial rulings rolling back federal protections for abortion rights, environmental rules, gun control laws, affirmative action policies, and protections for LGBTQ Americans — until now.
The push for reform came after a series of ethics scandals involving Supreme Court justices Clarence Thomas. ProPublica reported that Thomas received and failed to disclose two decades worth of private jet and superyacht trips from Harlan Crow, a conservative billionaire. Crow also reportedly bought a house from Thomas, allowed the justice’s elderly mother to live there for free, and paid for two years of boarding school tuition for Thomas’ grandnephew.
Last year, The New York Timesreported that a health insurance executive gave Thomas a loan — and later forgave much of it — for the justice to purchase a luxury RV. As Rolling Stone reported, while the loan was still active, Thomas authored a Supreme Court opinion broadly benefiting the health insurance industry. The Washington Postseparately reported that Leonard Leo, who helped assemble the Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority as Donald Trump’s judicial adviser, secretly steered consulting payments to Thomas’ wife.
The cloud of scandal has also extended to Justice Samuel Alito: ProPublica found that Paul Singer, a billionaire hedge fund chief with business before the Supreme Court, provided Alito with a free private jet trip to Alaska, as part of an extravagant fishing trip arranged by Leo.
Thomas and Alito both faced calls to recuse themselves from the Supreme Court’s Jan. 6-related cases, including the one relating to Trump’s presidential immunity claims. Thomas’ wife, Ginni, endorsed Trump’s lies about the 2020 election, celebrated the Jan. 6 rally at the U.S. Capitol before it turned violent, and privately urged state lawmakers to help overturn Biden’s victory. Alito and his wife, Martha-Ann, flew two flags at their residences that have been adopted by right-wing factions that contest the legitimacy of the results of the 2020 election.
Both Alito and Thomas refused to recuse themselves in the immunity case.
On July 1, the Supreme Court ruled, at Trump’s request, that presidents are entitled to immunity from prosecution for official acts committed while in office. In his response to the ruling, Biden did not immediately endorse congressional action regarding the court, but rather called on voters to” render a judgment about Donald Trump’s behavior,”
“The American people must decide whether Donald Trump’s assault on our democracy on Jan. 6 makes him unfit for public office, the highest office in the land,” he said.
