Reluctant SC, Trump on a collision course
Criminal justice ‘overhaul’
WASHINGTON, Dec 11, (RTRS): The US Supreme Court’s reluctance to take up new cases on volatile social issues is putting it on a collision course with President Donald Trump, whose Justice Department is trying to rush such disputes through the appeals system to get them before the nine justices as quickly as possible.
That tension could come to head in 2019 if the court continues to avoid cases that the Republican president’s lawyers are aggressively trying to bring to the justices. The court’s 5-4 conservative majority includes Trump appointees Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch.
While Trump has suffered a series of setbacks in lower federal courts since taking office last year, he has collected major victories at the Supreme Court. Most notably, the court in June upheld in a 5-4 ruling Trump’s travel ban targeting people from several Muslim-majority countries, with Gorsuch casting a pivotal vote, after lower courts had blocked the policy.
But since Kavanaugh joined the bench in October after a bitter Senate confirmation fight, the court has declined to take up appeals by conservative-leaning states seeking to deny public funds to women’s healthcare and abortion provider Planned Parenthood, while postponing action on a dispute over federal employment protections opposed by Trump’s administration for gay and transgender people.
At the same time, the administration has been seeking to leap-frog more liberal-leaning lower courts to get cases on divisive questions over immigration, transgender rights and the US census before the justices more rapidly.
Trump
Cases
“The court seems to be in go-slow mode at the moment when it comes to big cases. The court appears content to focus on meat-and-potatoes cases rather than blockbuster ones,” said Kannon Shanmugam, a lawyer who regularly argues cases before the justices.
Trump has frequently railed against the lower courts, especially the liberal-leaning San Franciscobased 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals, that have ruled against him in some major cases including the travel ban.
In a setback to social and religious conservatives who strongly support Trump, the high court on Monday declined to take up appeals by Kansas and Louisiana to deny Planned Parenthood public funds under the Medicaid health insurance program for the poor.
Three of the court’s five conservatives voted to hear the matter, but with conservatives Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John Roberts declining to join them they fell a vote short of the required four needed to take up a case.
Conservative Justice Clarence Thomas accused his colleagues of ducking the case because of its controversial nature.
Last week, the court put off action in another divisive case involving whether federal employment law outlaws discrimination against gay and transgender people. There are three appeals on the issue begging attention from the court, but the justices have not yet acted.
The court also has delayed action in a case concerning Republican-drawn US congressional districts in North Carolina that were struck down by a lower court that found the boundaries were drawn to ensure lopsided electoral victories for their party against rival Democrats.
Criminal justice bill being revised:
A proposed overhaul of America’s prison policies and criminal sentencing standards was being revised on Monday as US lawmakers scrambled to win enough support for it ahead of the end of the year, senators said.
Revisions to the bill could pressure Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to bring it up for a vote, which he has so far declined to do, despite broad bipartisan support and backing by President Donald Trump.
The lame-duck session of Congress is expected to end this month. Backers of the bill fear delaying it until next year could give opponents more time to pick it apart.
Entitled the First Step Act, the bill would make it easier for deserving inmates to be released from prison into halfway houses or home confinement, create programs to reduce recidivism, and prevent first-time non-violent offenders from facing harsh mandatory minimum sentences.
The measure has stalled amid opposition from hard-right Republicans such as Senator Tom Cotton, as well as the National Sheriffs’ Association, which complained it could let “thousands of criminals out” of prison.
One change is expected to scale back discretion that judges have to sentence felons with criminal histories beneath mandatory minimums, one source said.
The proposal would take some discretion away from judges “in a very narrow area, but very important area,” said Senator Chuck Grassley, the Judiciary Committee chairman who supports the measure. “That’s what it took to get Senator (Ted) Cruz on board,” Grassley told reporters in the Capitol.
Cruz, a conservative Texan, confirmed to reporters that he supported the revisions. Last week, he said he was dropping his opposition after changes were made to how defendants charged with gun crimes were treated.
Republican Senator John Cornyn told reporters a new bill was being offered and he would support attaching it to a broader spending measure that is pending.
“I was talking with the National Sheriffs’ Association and giving them the good news that there’s been progress made in the direction they had requested. I’m not sure it’s going to be satisfactory to them. But I think it’s important we try to work with our law enforcement agencies,” Cornyn said.
Grassley, asked whether McConnell would back the revised measure, declared: “You tell me what it will take to get Senator McConnell on board. I don’t know what more we can do . ... I’m frustrated.” Grassley estimated three-fourths of the Senate would back the bill. Cotton said he was still opposed.