Biden pledges to name progressives to the Supreme Court, suggesting he expects vacancies
President Joe Biden promised Black voters Wednesday that he would appoint progressives to the US Supreme Court if elected to a second term, suggesting he expects vacancies on the high court over the next four years.
“The next president, they’re going to be able to appoint a couple justices, and I’ll be damned — if in fact we’re able to change some of the justices when they retire and put in really progressive judges like we’ve always had, tell me that won’t change your life,” he said during a campaign rally in Philadelphia.
It was as explicit a warning as Biden could offer about the stakes of the upcoming election, and a clear reminder that some of the nine justices have entered their seventies.
Clarence Thomas is 75 and Samuel Alito is 74; both are conservative and appointed by Republican presidents. Sonia Sotomayor, a liberal who was nominated by President Barack Obama, turns 70 next month.
Biden's going to need everyone's help. Turn the Senate and the House super Blue. Even if you hate Biden because of Israeli support, vote for your Rep and Senator that can deal with this corruption. Add to the bench until the traitors Thomas and Alito become irrelevant. Revise the number of Senate and House seats.
Trump said that "he (Trump) fully support's Israel's Gaza genocide."
Anything Biden can do, Trump can (and would) do worse.
Anything you can do, I can do better. I can do anything better than you.
Biden: I can support Israel’s killing of people in Gaza Trump: I will deport anyone that supports Palestine
Having been around awhile, it's so weird that people are trying to make the case that a republican presidency could be a good thing for... just about any country in the middle east. Not saying that any party is going to spend much time on it, but it's just a weird stretch.
Because people are that fucking gullible.
It's irrelevant what's happened or is happening unless it comes from timtok/Facebook/lemmy/reddit post.
Not voting for Biden is exactly what they want to achieve and people who haven't read past titles are their target.
Nobody thinks Trump will be good for the Middle East. They are just trying to pressure Biden to actually change his policy. The idea is he'll change course if he sees it's not popular and could threaten his election. I say publically it'll make a difference because I don't want Biden to support a genocide and it's the only tool I have, but I doubt it will. I'm sure they're all like me and live in a blue state, which means we're useless for the electoral college. He needs to try to get purple states.
And I'm sure that 70% of them are shills paid by the Kremlin to take down Biden so they can get Trump elected again.
Nah, I think genocides are just legitimately unpopular, especially among the youth who are probably overly represented on online media.
I don't think it's even just the red/blue state issue. I haven't seen many in a prime voting demographic who care about this issue and the ones that do care are concerned in terms of wasting taxpayer money. The overlap between demographics who aren't statistically likely to vote anyways and people who are concerned about this issue is looking like it may be pretty damning.
Ya, but he shouldn't turn away the youth vote imo. They had bigger than normal turnout in 2020 and they mostly went to him. It was still a small percentage of what the youth vote could've been if they got off their ass, but I think it still matters. It seems a risky gambit to abandon them for more reliable voting blocks that are also more hustorically conservative, especially if it means supporting a genocide and geographically and diplomatically isolating the US against the world. I have a feeling if you give the youth reasons to come out, they will.
I also feel like Gen Z is more political than past demographic, at least the ones I've talked to have been. But I might be all wrong here. Elections surprise even the pundits and analysts, so who could know after 2016.
The craziest thing to me are those further leftists threatening to abandon Biden and let Trump walk in.
I mean, they can complain and oppose the democrats all they want but they should also never ever forget that today’s GOP is just the latest incarnation of the leftist’s longtime fascist enemy. Keeping them from power is and always has been a top priority.
Right? it's like saying "I wanted chicken, not beef, but all we have is chicken.... So I'm just gonna eat the pellets in the Rat Poison bottle instead!"
I think that the majority of those are either accelerationists and/or state/political actors. Accelerationists soundly believe that the ends justify the means and think, despite a clear lack of solid evidence (and contrary evidence ex. Spain), that making things worse will force people to act to make things better. Mass repression and genocide of LGBTQ+ and POC are acceptable losses to reach Utopia... despite that literally never being the outcome at any point in recorded human history.
I hate that this sounds so dumb but we now live in a world where the truth sounds stupid
Again, a vote for a giant douche or a turd sandwich.
People keep claiming this, but never actually specify how Trump could possibly be worse than full-on support for genocide. Biden is 100% for the genocide, he has proved this and has put zero restrictions or conditions on Israel's far-right regime.
What we're seeing in Gaza under Biden will be the exact same thing we see under Trump.
This is not the argument neolibs want to be making at this time.
Yeah why would people just assume it will be worse with Muslim ban Donald who says "finish the job" and "deport the protesters?" Silly geese.
No, you're just illustrating what I'm talking about. How, specifically, do you envision Donald Trump being worse on this genocide than no strings attached support that Biden has given?
This lesser of two evils shit isn't working because Biden is showing himself to just be literally out and out evil. You guys need to come to terms with what you're supporting here, it's time to acknowledge how far to the right you've had to go to be trying to scare people into voting for your candidate with "nuances of genocide".
i.e. don't be a single-issue voter.
I'm a single issue voter and my single issue is proportional representation - I'll be voting for Biden but if a major party candidate did genuinely advocate for voting reform they'd probably have me.
I hate most of the Democratic party. I fear the Republican party. So yeah I'll be holding my nose and voting D.
That would be a decent protest. Have all the frustrated D voters wear a clothespin on their nose when they go to vote for the lesser evil.
Could actually get more people off the couch. Frustrated progressive voters would want to increase the ratio of "nose plug voters" to more effectively send their message to Biden while also helping kick out the Republicans.
I really like this idea! If enough people did it the media would absolutely pick up on it and amplify it.
Of course that does put people in red states in danger as they're announcing to everyone who can see them who they're voting for. :(
Make it happen Samurai
I'll be counting on you as a Canadian :)
It's easy to fall into a defeatist attitude with how fucked up everything is, but change starts with a belief that things can be changed.
Things can always be changed.
On the other hand, challenging worse hasn't gone well lately..
Spoken as a defeated Canadian who watched any hope of home ownership evaporate in the last 4 years.
same
I just want the GOP to get absolutely pummeled for once so we can move the overton window back in the right direction. No I don't like the dems. Yes I will vote for them every time as they represent the closest to what I want.
Not going to happen while they're still taking AIPAC money, that shit is toxic to actual turn-out for Dems at this point.
Voting dem still moves the overton window right. "Vote blue no matter who" rewards them time after time for sprinting right chasing voters that were never going to vote for him while becoming too right even for centrists
Hijacking this comment thread to promote Ranked Choice Voting.
And theres only one party that has outlawed RCV in certain areas. We aren't getting RCV without 2 things:
-Primary moderates and elect progressive Democrats at every level we can -A Democratic supermajority in Congress
Not sure what you mean by outlaw, but there are definitely democratic politicians who have shot down RCV on their ballots.
S Dakota, Idaho, Montana, Tennessee, and Florida have all banned RCV. Bunch of other GOP controlled statehouses have proposed bills to do the same.
I'm sure there are individual legislators in the Democratic party that have shot down RCV but its opposition is nowhere near that of the GOP.
Got it. Yeah nobody in power wants RCV. Don’t be fooled by their inaction.
BillyWitchDoctor.com more comfortable... with chicken
ARISE! ARISE CHICKEN!
Shh... He is legend...
RCV, Approval, and STAR my beloved
STAR, score, or approval! Not sure why people are obsessed with ranked, they must love curing ballots and being prevented from tallying districts individually?
100% would rather have ranked over FPTP, just to be clear. FPTP is toxic garbage.
No need to be hostile to them. RCV is pedalled very hard, so naturally people who've heard about alternative voting systems will know it first.
Is there good videos on STAR or score like there is ranked or approval? I first heard about alternative voting systems from that one stick figure YouTube guy. Not sure if he's made any other election based videos I've missed or if other people have made equally good ones about other voting systems.
I don't know if they'll be as entertaining as a pro YouTuber but there is a webpage with some explainer videos https://www.starvoting.org/videos
Thanks!
Because those still encourage strategic voting. With RCV, you can vote your conscious and be certain that it won't backfire and help your enemies.
I'd rather a voting system maximize voter satisfaction than minimize strategic voting. And I'd rather have people exhaust their ballots intentionally than accidentally.
What are STAR voters going to do, give everyone either all or no points? Their votes might not be counted in the final round, that's their choice.
Being forced to vote strategically is why so many voters are dissatisfied.
I mean, you can look at the mathematical simulations of the models or you can argue over the semantics. STAR discourages voting strategically somewhat by having two stages. If that is not enough, even voting purely strategically it has higher voter satisfaction than ranked.
I remain highly skeptical if the idea that many people would engage in strategic voting unless it's extremely obvious how to do it.
Boo RCV - we should just go parliamentary and stop direct election of the executive branch!
We'd need a constitutional convention. Or the largest amendment we've ever had. RCV can be done simply by the states.
Yea, if RCV is all we can get I'm not going to let the perfect be the enemy of the good... and hopefully with RCV we could get better leadership... but it'd be wonderful if we could get off direct executive elections.
Perhaps with RCV (or whatever) you can elect leadership that will allow that.
Because that's been going so great for the UK...
The UK has shitty FPTP like we have here but their government never deadlocks. The US government can fail in a very special way where the president can be reduced to only being able to veto legislation while trying not to be impeached and it's fucking dumb.
We need a government that's both representative and functional and there's a reason why modern nations have looked at directly elected executives and parliamentary system and vastly preferred the latter.
People need to remember that Biden merely supports Israel, Trump would have nuked Palestine off the face of the Earth by now.
Biden should be scared of losing his job or he has no incentive to do what the people want.
You have a list of senators and house reps that will keep Biden and potentially Trump in check?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_members_of_the_Congressional_Progressive_Caucus
In terms of which progressive candidates are running to beat incumbents that varies from state to state.
Any progressive incumbents we should definitely not vote for?
Fetterman kinda sucks now lol. But I don't know anything about if he's up for reelection or if someone worse is running, so I shouldn't comment 😅
Sure you do. Think back to your school classes. Senators are elected for 6-year terms. Fetterman is basically brand new so that means his election was the last cycle, or 2022. 2022 + 6 years equals 2028 reelection.
Makes sense! It's like that knowledge subconsciously entered my brain right after I typed it, because the realization that he probably isn't running made me add that caveat lol.
Actually progressive or "biden is the most progressive president in recent US history" progressive? I'll take either over the alternative, but I'd love it if it was more than former than the latter.
If he promises to let Bernie Sanders pick them then I bet he'd gain whole percentage points in polls.
Can Bernie be president on Wednesdays and Thursdays?
he has pickle ball on Thursdays
Wednesdays and Fridays then.
Cmon, you know it's the latter.
Still a lot better than anything Trump would come up with.
I'll take anyone who isn't a corporate careerist at this point. The people sitting on the supreme court shouldn't be expecting to leverage it to make an exhorbitant amount of money.
They'd absolutely still be massive corporatists who think freedom dies if Americans can actually afford any of their basic needs.
At least he's talking about the views of a justice he might pick, rather than what race and sex they're going to be as though that's the most important criteria.
Yes, but he's also shown himself willing to say anything to get support and votes. He had a lot of big progressive talk during his campaign when he was against Sanders, but then dropped that facade pretty much within the first few months and started giving out corporate handjobs.
He's going to appoint Merrick Garland again.
"Just as soon as the court decides that the President is immune from prosecution, I expect there will be six vacancies soon after." wink
TBH, I think that's an excellent threat to get them off their asses on the Trump decision pending. Even if he doesn't mean to kill them, it would be a no-brainer for congress to impeach them given the lack of republican party cohesion over Trump candidacy.
He should pull an FDR and try to get the court expanded to 12.
11 or 13. You don't do even numbers on the SC so there aren't voting ties.
13 makes the most sense. There are 13 circuits, why not 13 Supreme Court justices?
…and the district judges themselves elect/appoint their representatives to SCotUS. Get political appointees out of the top bench, I’ll take an unelected meritocracy over cronyism and patronage any day.
I like that Idea. It doesn't entirely solve the problem of political appointees since the lower court judges are themselves appointed, but it does provide a layer of abstraction to where the judge isn't directly beholden to a party, in theory.
It's not like Trump appointed hundreds of judges... right?
It would at least (in theory) kick the politicization of judges to the circuit level and promote the same borderline majority opinions there instead - but make accession to SCotUS a supermajority. Hopefully then the only ones they can agree on are outstanding jurists.
Or if it does fall prey to partisan agendas, then it makes the ideological bent of SCotUS stable-ish.
The Deep South gets two seats
New England one seat
Two for the Midwest
‘The West’ two seats
The Bible/Rust belt one
And three for the East Coat & inland
I...huh. Never thought of this tbh.
Yeah agreed. I never quite understood FDRs thinking on putting an even number of people in the court. We have so many 5-4 decisions now an even court would be chaos.
Force a definitive decision, instead of precedent that keeps getting overturned?
Tennis woks kinda like that.
Can’t they recuse or abstain from voting though?
They can, but as we can see from Thomas and Alito, they don't.
Yes. But that rarely happens (usually just because of health issues). There are very few decisions that have been made where all the members didn't weigh in. When even votes have happened the lower court ruling will stand as is. Which is particularly bad when you have places like the 5th circuit trying their best to fascism.
12 with ties being decided by a season of survivor.
13 is a better number, it matches the number of Federal Appelate Courts.
If Democrats manage to take both houses of Congress and the Presidency, I would advocate for immediately passing a law to increase the size of the SC to 13, effective for the start of the SC's 2026 term.
Then, Democrats and Republicans should go to work to enact a Constitutional Amendment for term limits on the SC. Republicans would finally have incentive to do it quickly, or else Biden would name 4 young Liberals to the SC who will be there 40+ years without term limits.
also 13 original colonies.. 13 stripes on the flag.
some magahead: so that means 1.2..3..4.....7 republicans........ and 1..2....6 confederates?
Hey, some of us smart people can't do that basic math either 😭
(In my case, calculus and ADHD combined powers to make me useless with actual numbers, real and imaginary, lol)
Imaginary numbers aren't Real - they can't hurt you.
I think a better solution should tie SC seats to the number of federal district courts. That way, should the number grow in the future, SC seats will be added automatically
Yes, that is better, but would require a Constitutional Amendment to formalize, otherwise a future Congress can just change it. Which is why you start with expansion, then force the Republicans to the table to discuss the amendment under a time limit.
If I'm not mistaken, Biden could add seats if he wanted to, so could any president. I think no one wants to do it because then the other party would add more as well.
The size of the SC is set through legislation, so a law would need to pass Congress, and the President would need to sign it. So one party can't do it unilaterally unless they control both houses of Congress and the Presidency.
I wish he would. The only thing stopping him, ironically, is his fear of appearing partisan (and angering “moderate” republicans, if they even exist anymore), despite the fact that that’s exactly what this would be attempting to remedy.
I’d love to be wrong, but he’ll never do it. He’s barely even willing to talk about the supreme court’s corruption and blatant bias. I think he’s allergic to that much institutional change.
He called Trump semi-fascist in 2022 and backed off since. Biden does not push the limits of any power he wields.
You'll note there has been an endless amount of arguments about Biden's limitations to his ability and power to effect change, but never that he is pushed up against those limits.
Biden was most popular when he was fighting for Green New Deal and BBB. But his inability to whip his party into voting for the platform the Democratic party ran on was disappointing and he has never recovered.
He also implied he would be a one-term president and turn the reins over to someone younger. I'm so fucking sick of old, white men!
I hate that his pledge to be a one-term president was the deciding factor for me in 2020. I was so frustrated with the Clyburn maneuver to neutralize Bernie's momentum that I needed something that made me believe the goddamn reality of this 2024 ticket wouldn't come to be.
He won’t. Biden would have done it already.
Well, since it is legal for a President to order assassinations… why not open SCOTUS up to some new blood?
It's very likely the GOP will win control of the Senate, and if they do McConnell would sooner die than let Biden even consider nominating someone.
Still gonna vote for Biden though, because if Trump wins the Conservative justices will all retire at once and they'll nominate 30-year-olds to fill in. I don't want 60+ more years of a Conservative court majority!
McConnell has already said he would step down from Senate leadership, so some other guy would get the task of impeding everything Biden does.
However, things are looking better than they used to that Democrats will at least be able to hold the Senate to a 50/50 split, and possibly also pick off Ted Cruz in Texas. Democrats who are not fond of Biden don't seem to be taking it out on their Senate candidates. There are several states where Biden is trailing, yet the incumbant Democratic Senator still has a good lead.
Let me stop you right there, because this man has already shown his word doesn't mean anything. It shifts with the political winds.
Democrats have to win in a lot of red states this time around. I'd be over the moon if that happened, but maybe we should have a backup plan in case Democrats lose in Ohio, Montana and Texas.
Democrats already have 51 seats (counting the independants). WV is a lost cause, but if they keep the seats they currently hold (including Arizona), that's how they get to the tie at 50.
You point out Ohio and Montana where holding that seat will be hard, but signs are pointing up.
Biden not causing many stiffies will have a negative impact on the number of those actually going to the polls though
Ted Cruz losing his senate seat would unironically be celebrated by every single person there. Republicans hate that guy. They appreciate his vote, but he is absolutely despised.
"Expecting vacancies" could be interpreted as an axe-related threat against some of the more conservative judges. I'm not 100% opposed to the idea.
“Will no one rid me of these turbulent judges?”
"Then I will!"
While it's POSSIBLE there will be vacancies in the next presidential term, the two oldest, Thomas and Alito, will still be younger in 2028 than Biden is now.
So I wouldn't exactly hold my breath on Biden getting the picks.
Whoever serves from '28 to '32 will likely get to replace both Thomas and Alito, then the next two oldest are Roberts and Sotomayor.
According to Trump's lawyers, Biden could use Seal Team Six to ... create some vacancies.
Clearly never going to happen, but it's too silly of an actual legal argument to ignore.
This had better not be a “well, we waited to fill these until the election year so that we can use it to mobilize the base”.
One, because it’s terribly cynical and self serving.
Two, because it doesn’t work on progressives nearly as well as they think. It runs the risk of alienating voters because they don’t feel respected for 3.5 years out of 4.
I don't think it is (though Dems seem to pull that often). Supreme Court Justices seem to have a very hard time letting go of the power, even on the more progressive side (Notorious R.B.G. being the most recent example). There's basically no way to remove a supreme court justice, impeachment will pretty much never happen. I think it's more recognizing that multiple who are 75 years old in a stressful job and being targeted by the public more and more is likely to lead to at least one of them leaving, be it death or retirement.
Doubt any would retire willingly. It's a sad state of affairs that judges will go until death before allowing the other side replace them.
Nah, triple the size and pack it full. It's our only hope.
Playing devil's advocate but couldn't that backfire spectacularly? The
born again nazisRepublicans play the long game and we could see even larger scrotus stacked withnazisRepublicans.They'll do that as soon as it suits them anyway.
Herod's Law
He won't. They'll be centrist/liberals at best
Or he expects there to be no vacancies, giving him the option to say whatever he thinks might get him votes without ever having to follow through on his promises.
Or expanding the court is on the table, also a way to create vacancies
best case scenario is that they're his definition of progressives which means that they would also think that the gaza genocide is acceptable
so now on top of not being that other he is saying he will be a better president in the next four years because he thinks people might die
he is really grasping at straws at this point
executive order abortion rights in, legalize cannabis, and raise the minimum wage a lot
that alone would guarantee him this next election no debates or speeches or anything else would be needed
Is executive order enough to raise the minimum wage?
I guess he could order all federal agencies will only work with companies that pay some new minimum.
Feels like abortion would get destroyed by the 5th circuit and the supreme court just like many of the other things they've tried to do
Unlike what most people think, executive orders aren't magic documents that lets the President legislate whatever they want on a whim. There are limits. They've grown a lot in scope over the decades, and if anything they need to be pulled back, but there are still limits.
I agree, and on paper you are correct. But also I have moved to the "it's the thought that counts" side of things. It seems to be more effective politicking these days to try and ram through something like an abortion EO and use the inevitable opposition (and legal?) pushback to say "see I'm fuckin trying over here" rather than to just stand there idly brandishing "plans" this is something the left needs to learn from the right. See the senate: Chuck Schumer should have started impeachment inquiries into Alito and Thomas yesterday, knowing full well they aren't actually going anywhere. It puts the issue in front of people.
I see what you're saying, but I'm also already foreseeing the next set of whiners saying "Biden knew it would fail, and he only did it to pretend to do something". Which I've seen with student loan forgiveness.
no he did some less than quarter ass measure for student loan forgiveness, asked for more votes/ funding, and then that was it same as with women's rights
and acted like he almost did as much as his god could do
atrophied is the same as actively supporting fascism with speeches, policies, and laws
It suggests that Republican SCOTUS judges might want to retire but they aren't under any obligation to do so in the next 4 years. Unless he's ready to pull the trigger on court reforms or he's got an assassin lined up this is just another empty promise.
Not sure whether to poke at the fact that there probably won't be any vacancies or that he would actually choose a progressive considering people are resigning from his administration every week over Gaza.
"Whelp, I tried but we can't get the votes to confirm them"
On average since Washington, each Presidential term has had 2.1 SCOTUS appointments. It's not a bad expectation, statistically speaking. But it's just an average, since Biden only has one so far, and Trump got three.
averages, am I right (wheres my FUCKING .1?)
Progressives, conservatives. Whatever. Just give me someone with a moral compass and a spine.
So, progressives?
Honestly the best trick conservatives ever pulled was convincing people that everyone is as immoral and spineless as they are. "All politicians / judges / whatever are corrupt" is complete bullshit, but somehow people seem to have bought into it
When are you guys going to come out of the closet and start openly calling yourselves Marxists?
Fuck "morality". Morality has a well-known progressive bias.
Always add more cooks to kitchen for better food, no that's not the saying...
Obviously, the problem with the SCOTUS is that there's too many of them. If we were to make John Roberts the singular all-powerful Supreme-ist justice, that would fix everything.