‘Pay The Price’: Dems Hear List Of Their Party’s Threats Against Conservative SCOTUS Justices At Ethics Hearing

‘Pay The Price’: Dems Hear List Of Their Party’s Threats Against Conservative SCOTUS Justices At Ethics Hearing

Katelynn Richardson on May 2, 2023

• Republicans highlighted Democrats’ history of making statements attempting to intimidate the Supreme Court during Tuesday’s Senate Judiciary Committee on Supreme Court ethical standards.
• “I want to tell you, Gorsuch; I want to tell you, Kavanaugh; You have released the whirlwind, and you will pay the price. You won’t know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said on the Supreme Court steps in 2020.
• Sen. John Kennedy noted how Democrats’ actions have aggravated heightened tensions after the Dobbs decision leak, which led to protests outside conservative justices’ homes, an assassination attempt on Kavanaugh and the publication of the location of Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s children’s school.

During Tuesday’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Supreme Court ethical standards, Republicans took a look back at Democrats’ history of threatening and attempting to indimidate the Supreme Court, spanning back to the smearing of Justice Clarence Thomas with unfounded allegations of sexual harassment during his confirmation hearing.

Republican Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy read aloud the words then-Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer spoke on the Supreme Court steps in 2020, addressing Justices’ Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh by name to warn them they have “released the whirlwind” and “will pay the price” if they “go forward with these awful decisions.” Multiple senators pointed out that Democrats have indeed released a “whirlwind” against the Supreme Court, threatening to pack the Court and trying to force them to change how they operate by imposing new ethics standards.

“Wow, just wow,” Kennedy said after reading Schumer’s statement. “I think Matthew 12:36 is correct, ‘For by thy words you shall be justified, and by thy words you shall be condemned.’”

Kennedy continued to note how Democrats’ actions have aggravated heightened tensions after the Dobbs decision leak, which led to protests outside conservative justices’ homes, an assassination attempt on Kavanaugh and the publication of the location of Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s children’s school.

.@SenJohnKennedy: “Today’s hearing is an excuse to sling more mud at an institution that some…Democrats don’t like because they can’t control it 100% of the time.

That’s a fact.” pic.twitter.com/U3Nfo4uWHf

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) May 2, 2023

Republican Texas Sen. John Cornyn later played a video from Thomas’ confirmation hearing in 1991, drawing a parallel between then and now.

Anita Hill claimed Thomas sexually harassed her while she worked for him at the Department of Education, which the White House said was unfounded after an investigation.

“[This] is a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you,” Thomas said during his confirmation hearing. “You will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of the U.S. — U.S. Senate, rather than hung from a tree.”

Tuesday’s hearing was prompted by reports alleging Justice Clarence Thomas violated ethics rules by not disclosing vacations he took with his friend and billionaire Harlan Crow, which Thomas said colleagues told him was not reportable as “personal hospitality” from a close friend.

Liberal justices have taken actions that would have been criticized if they were conservative, multiple senators noted.

Sonia Sotomayor amended her financial disclosures to include trips paid for by a third-party, and Justice Jackson noted on her nominee disclosure that she previously omitted information about consulting income her spouse “periodically receives from consulting on medical malpractice cases.” In 2010, Justice Ruth Bater Ginsburg accepted an award from the Woman’s National Democratic Club.

In a 2019 amicus brief cited by Republican Utah Sen. Mike Lee, Democratic Senators Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, Mazie K. Hirono of Hawaii, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Dick Durbin of Illinois and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York said the Supreme Court “is not well.”

“And the people know it,” the senators wrote. “Perhaps the Court can heal itself before the public demands it be ‘restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics.’”

“They aren’t getting their way, so they want to change the rules,” Kennedy said. “But the constitution is in the game…The constitutional separation of powers means that no branch of the federal government can dictate how another should govern itself as black letter law.”