The 2024 presidential election is not about bread-and-butter politics and kitchen table issues. This election is different. At the heart of voters’ decision this November is whether they wish to continue to live under a democratic republic.
The Republican candidate for president is a convicted felon. He casts doubt on the integrity of the last election he lost. He denies involvement in Project 2025, a plan to consolidate executive power and limit checks on the White House. Yet, over 200 of his former administration members have contributed to the project.
This former president has appointed three justices to the Supreme Court. His party is responsible for creating a 6-3 conservative supermajority. With this supermajority, he and the office of the president have been granted absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts. These precedent-blind decisions are what happen when you have a Court without balance — and a strongman willing to test the limits of constitutional norms.
With fear for our democracy, I will vote against Donald Trump. With fear for our democracy, I will vote to restore order and balance to our judiciary.
Under the purview of our democratic republic, an independent judiciary has played an essential role in maintaining the rule of law and democratic principles. Its power of judicial review and interpretation of the laws passed by Congress ensures that no act of government oversteps constitutional boundaries. As outlined in Federalist No. 78, the judiciary serves as a safeguard against legislative encroachments and arbitrary governance.
The Supreme Court is the highest in our nation and sets the tone for the rest of the judiciary to follow. This Court being balanced and nonpartisan is of the utmost importance. It is again in Federalist No. 78 where Hamilton writes, “The judiciary … has no influence over either the sword or the purse,” meaning that the Court cannot finance or enforce its decisions. Their power rests solely on the American public’s confidence in their impartiality and willingness to follow their opinions.
Therein lies the issue of a supermajority being appointed by the Republican Party for our democracy, and one of the many reasons I cannot vote for Donald Trump. Such a supermajority is not currently healthy for our democracy and will only do more damage if it grows under a second Trump presidency. Unlike previous supermajority Courts, this one is perceived by many to be especially partisan. Recent reports, such as those uncovering Justice Alito’s strong and unapologetic conservative religious views and analyses highlighting the Court’s clear rightward shift, underscore this point. This perception undermines the ideal of the Court as an impartial institution.
Additionally, when a Court lacks a close split along ideological lines, it is deprived of diversity of legal opinion. You have a Court that looks at the issues before it, on the whole, identically, using incredibly similar lines of reasoning. The justices in the majority become far less interested in considering the views of those in the minority because they know they have the votes. There is less desire for consensus. There is less desire to be incremental.
There is, in fact, an incentive to bulldoze through well-settled legal precedents. Remember “Roe” and “Casey,” which enshrined reproductive rights? Gone. Remember “Bakke,” allowing universities to utilize affirmative action in admissions? Gone. Remember “Chevron,” a mainstay of administrative law? Gone. Remember the notion that no one, even the president, is above the law? Gone. In a matter of four years, this supermajority has discarded decades of legal precedent.
“Stare decisis,” the foundational Latin phrase meaning “let the decision stand,” is a cornerstone of our judicial system. It should not be that precedents of such stature are thrown out every term. When it appears that every precedent is up for grabs — then the legal system is jolted on its head. Yes, there are clearly cases and instances when precedent must change and decisions mustn’t stand. But these instances do not and should not occur every term. Precedents should only be overruled when they are unworkable, cause significant hardship, legal principles have evolved, or changes in facts render the old rule obsolete. This supermajority has shown minimal effort to respect these legal guidelines which produce consistencies in our system. By simply overruling precedents they do not like, they appear to the public as ideologues in robes. Compared to supermajorities of the past, they mark themselves as unique in our modern politics.
As a result, I believe they have discarded the American public’s confidence in their impartiality. It cannot be that when personnel changes, so too does the law. Polls continue to show that the Court is experiencing record lows in approval. Granted, this institution’s job is not to be popular, but it cannot ignore its need for confidence. When the American people stop believing in the Court’s legitimacy to decide the law, the entire relationship between the branches of government and the rule of law will falter. By continuing to disrupt settled areas of the law, this supermajority does not help itself.
Given the erosion of public trust and the instability it fosters within our legal system, it is imperative to restore balance to the Supreme Court. Not necessarily to change what this supermajority has done, but to prevent them from going further. When the next president of the United States is inaugurated in January 2025 there will be four justices above the age of 70. The eldest two are Justice Thomas and Justice Alito, who represent the far end of the conservative wing of the Court. Vacancies and retirements are on the horizon — so too are future appointments.
Herein lies the potential for either a Democratic president to appoint justices with living constitutional or judicial pragmatic approaches to the law — and reshape the Supreme Court back to the center. Or, for a man who promises to only be a dictator for “day one” to get a go at one– two– three– or four more appointments to the highest court in the country. Yes, to some, this may sound apocalyptic and out of the realm of possibility. But never say never. Illness, family needs, age, and death are all promised in time. There is a world in which the man who incited a riot to storm the Capitol appoints six to seven of the justices on the high court and grows the Republican supermajority to 7-2.
I hope this day will not come. I hope that I am wrong. But I still fear I could be right and that the writing was on the wall with the most recent Trump v. United States decision. The supermajority was in full effect in this opinion, which was 6-3 along ideological lines. Chief Justice Roberts writing for the Court finds that “the President’s exercise of his core constitutional powers … immunity [from criminal prosecution] must be absolute. As for his remaining official actions, he is also entitled to immunity.” Yes, a president like Donald Trump may violate the very laws he is tasked to enforce and be immune from criminal prosecution so long as it falls within his “official acts.”
In her dissent, Justice Sotomayor wrote for the three Democratic appointees, “The relationship between the President and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law.”
The supermajority has refashioned the presidency as imperial. Justice Sotomayor continued to capture the alarming consequences of this new shift in the president’s power: “Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune.”
She would then go on to close without the traditional “I respectfully dissent” and instead opted for a phrasing I echo today, “With fear for our democracy, I dissent.”
If Donald Trump is elected, I do not doubt he may try to put the entirety of the executive branch under his control: The Department of Justice and FBI will belong to Donald Trump. This is not speculation. This is a playbook created by his allies, and the Supreme Court, with its conservative supermajority, will likely offer no resistance.
So it is with fear this November that I vote. Our country is in a moment of peril, and a grave test for our democracy is unfolding. The choice is clear: to defend our democratic institutions and the rule of law or to allow their erosion at the hands of unchecked power. The future of our republic hangs in the balance, including the independence and integrity of our courts — especially the Supreme Court. With a solemn determination to protect our democracy, I will cast my ballot against Donald Trump and the Republican Party that aids and abets him.
Senior U.S. Editor
