Business as usual for justices in D.C. uncertainty

WASHINGTON — Amid insurrection and impeachment, the Supreme Court’s big news Thursday was a decision in a bankruptcy case. Wednesday brought arguments over the Federal Trade Commission’s ability to recapture ill-gotten gains.

At this fraught moment in U.S. history, the court is doing its best to keep its head down, going about its regular business and putting off as many politically charged issues as it can, including whether President Donald Trump’s tax returns must be turned over to prosecutors in New York.

The court’s work continues though the coronavirus pandemic is preventing the justices from meeting in person, either for their private conferences or argument sessions. Chief Justice John Roberts has received both doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, but not every member of the court has, the court said.

The building itself has been closed to the public since March because of the pandemic. Since the weekend, it has been ringed by hard-to-climb fences that also surround the Capitol.

Meanwhile, the Constitution says the chief justice is to preside at the impeachment trial of a president. But what about an ex-president?

Like so much else about the Constitution, the answer is subject to interpretation.

If Trump’s trial begins after Wednesday, which is likely, it’s not clear whether Roberts would make his way to the Senate chamber as he did last year for Trump’s first trial. Impeachment scholars, law professors and political scientists offer differing views.

The choices appear to be Roberts, Kamala Harris, who by then will be vice president, or Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-VT., who will be the Senate’s president pro tem after the Democrats gain control of the Senate.

The issue is “unsettled, completely without precedent, and unspecific in existing Senate rules and precedents,” Princeton University political scientist Keith Whittington wrote in an email.