Update: And I see we have a request for the dancing banana.
So birthright citizenship is safe. Trump meltdown on the way … Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch dissented. Kavanaugh quibbled with the majority opinion reasoning but voted with the majority anyway. Here’s the decision. I haven’t read it yet.
Skimming through social media comments, I’ve noticed an alarming number of people who think the Supreme Court has just created some radical new policy regarding immigrants. One commenter worried that Hispanic people born here before the decision would now suddenly become citizens, as if they weren’t already citizens. I swear, ignorance is killing us.
In other decisions, SCOTUS allowed states to ban transgender athletes from competing in their schools. And in In National Republican Senatorial Committee v. Federal Election Commission, the Court ruled 6-3 with the Republicans (big surprise) that federal limits on coordinated campaign expenditures by political parties violate the First Amendment.
I’ll post more here if I see any juicy reactions or commentaries.
Update: I’m seeing news stories saying Alito is retiring. I’m also seeing news stories retracting the stories that Alito is retiring.
Update: I haven’t heard of any reaction from Trump, but the rest of MAGA is having a meltdown. You’d think the SCOTUS had created some new immigration law rather than just uphold what’s been in the bleeping Constitution since 1868.
Update: Mike Johnson and some others are seizing on Kavanaugh’s opinion, which (I understand) is that the President has no authority to change birthright citizenship, but Congress could. Again, I haven’t found Kavanaugh’s opinion in all the mountain of writing about this decision today. But that’s what I’ve read.
So that’s going to be the next attempt. The problem is that it appears to be the clear opinion of five of the justices that birthright citizenship is guaranteed in the 14th Amendment, period, and the Constitution can’t be overwritten by legislation alone any more than it can be overwritten by executive orders. But I bet they’re going to try. See Johnson Follows Kavanaugh’s Lead, Says Congress Will ‘Deal With’ Birthright Citizenship by Nicole LaFond at TPM.
IANAL, but as I understand it, it was 6-3 that Tubby can't rewrite the Constitution by executive fiat, 5-4 that the Constitution says what it says.
Maha, you mistake wingnuts (purported) reverence for the Constitution with their actually knowing anything about what's in the Constitution (other than the 2nd Amendment).
Yes, the same relationship Christian nationalists have with the Bible. But it's still aggravating to see how many people actually didn't understand what birthright citizenship is and think the SCOTUS somehow changed something.
"Supreme Court rules 6-3 to strike down limits on how much party committees can spend in coordination with candidates. The latest ruling over the last two decades to unravel campaign finance restrictions. On ideological lines, written by Kavanaugh"
Yay, Dancing Banana!
I'm pleased, but not really surprised. I still view the Roberts Court as beholden to the Federalist Society and their (Trad GOP) donors, whose interests often conflict with Trump's.
IMO, the vision of Project 2025 must have provisions for inhibiting the resistance. Call me paranoid but I think the fascists want the power to deport citizens who actively speak out, demonstrate, and agitate for a return to the actual principles of Democracy. Th ey have to silence the resistance, make it unlawful, and terrorize patriots into submission. Melodramatic? Maybe. Wrong? I don't think so. Miller and his ilk are not playing around.
So this is more important than the worthy result of protecting US citizens from having their citizenship revoked and the threat of deportation hanging over their heads if they object in the mildest way. Miller and his band of merry men will be in legal trouble every time they threaten a citizen. And they will go after protesters, but the backlash from the twin murders in the twin cities forced ICE into a much less intimidating public posture.) Trump's legal attacks on citizens have repeatedly failed, from Sandwich Man to Comey. The jury system, written into the Constitution, is a problem. I think just exporting people is the plan, and the USSC just blew a big hole in an early stage of the process.
If anyone wants to note that I don't have much supporting evidence for my theory, I concede the point. But Trump likes to throw the label 'traitor' on his detractors. I think it's a tell. He'd like to imprison, execute or deport. But there's the pesky feature of due process that the Supremes have not swept away for citizens. Non-citizens are in a permanent 'open season' status. But not me – not yet.
Elkern's observation about the Federalist Society is astute. The FS was not crazy about tariffs because they cut into the profit margin. Business does better under free trade. Trump was encumbering trade EVERYWHERE. The FS does not seem to care about the labor immigrants provide. So Trump is being permitted to violate human rights with impunity – against non-citizens. The majority viewed that the US voter would NOT embrace atrocities against citizens, and I do view a 'birthright citizen' as equal to me.
ICE arrested a Catholic num on her way to Mass on Sunday. She got sprung on Monday, I guess, after they found her and after members of Congress got involved. We nay find out what happens if you piss off the Pontiff.
Dancing Banana GIF is not really warranted, I think.
It's outrageous that the Supremes even agreed to hear the case at all. The Constitution is so clear and plain-spoken on the point that any lawyer who filed such a case ought to be referred to their State Bar Association for discipline, possibly including disbarment.
And the case was 6-3 for the issue under discussion, but there were dissents suggesting at best a 5-4 result against a law purporting to abrogate the 14th Amendment.
The actual news is pretty grim, I'm saying.