Senators on both sides of the aisle are defending the Supreme Court’s decision to review whether former President Donald Trump can appear on the presidential ballot despite his lawyer’s claim that Justice Brett Kavanaugh would “step up” and rule in his favor.
Alina Habba, one of Trump’s lead attorneys in his myriad criminal and legal cases, welcomed the notion of the Supreme Court taking up the ballot access matter in a Fox News interview last Thursday. The court announced one day later it would review the decision by Colorado’s Supreme Court to bar Trump from the 2024 ballot.
“I think it should be a slam dunk in the Supreme Court. I have faith in them,” Habba said. “You know, people like Kavanaugh, who the president fought for, who the president went through how to get into place, he’ll step up.”
Habba’s comments did not deter members of the Senate Judiciary Committee from voicing their support for the court’s decision to take up the matter, including among Democrats who have been critical of the current justices.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), who has led the charge to urge Congress to implement an ethics code on the Supreme Court, told the Washington Examiner on Monday that his feelings on the case were yet to be determined.
“They could surprise us,” Whitehouse said of the court.
Whitehouse, who has urged his fellow lawmakers to get behind a bill that would allow a panel of chief judges from lower courts to investigate allegations of impropriety by the nine justices, previously told the Washington Examiner in November that he wouldn’t be satisfied “until the Supreme Court has a proper code of ethics and a way of enforcing it like every other court in the country.”
“This court has become so blatantly and practically politicized that its decision will lack a high degree of credibility, but it has to decide institutionally what the outcome is going to be,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) said. “We can’t have every state making this decision on its own. It’s a question of federal law that the highest federal court has to decide.”
Sen. Peter Welch (D-VT) called the Supreme Court’s move “a necessary thing” while recognizing his worries with some conservative justices and other ethics concerns.
“It’s a very difficult question. I don’t think Trump should be on the ballot. I think he should have been impeached,” Welch said. “It’s hard to see how we have state-by-state adjudication of whether a person can be a candidate, so it’s got to be resolved by the Supreme Court.”
Asked if he was concerned about how the bench would rule on the matter, Welch replied, “I have no faith in this Supreme Court.” He would not say if he believed Kavanaugh should recuse himself from the case.
Republicans, ranging from Trump allies to foes, expressed similar satisfaction about the high court taking up the matter.
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“That needs to be cleared up,” Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), a member of GOP leadership, told the Washington Examiner. “If we have 50 states with 50 different rules, that’s just a recipe for more chaos. I’m glad they’re doing it.”
“Talk about an assault on democracy. I don’t know how you can defend these partisan judges saying to voters, ‘No, actually, you shouldn’t be able to vote.’ This is assuming he wins the primary, but he can’t even be on the primary ballot,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) said. “It’s unbelievable, and I do think that the consequences of this are really, really, really dangerous.”