Legal AF
Jan 4, 2025
[Michael Popok] If a company issued an annual report like this, ignoring all the material facts of what happened to it, or what it caused during the prior year, they would be both indicted and sued for Securities fraud, right? Right. You'd be like, "I wonder what happened at the Supreme Court Incorporated."
Court Accountability Action's Lisa Graves and Alex Aronson join Popok to explain Chief Justice Roberts attacks on the American People, and attempt to sanewash the illegitimacy of the Supreme Court in his annual report, and how America regains its seat at table to make constitutional decisions for themselves.
Transcript
welcome to a
2025 brand new first edition legal AF
meets Court accountability
action and of course your hosts for this
hot take on everything J John Roberts
and the new end of year report we got
Lisa Graves we got Alex Aronson and of
course Michael popok so every year let
me frame this and I'm gonna turn it over
to the experts every every year the
chief justice has one opportunity to say
what keeps them up at night and talk
directly to the American people about
the state of the Judiciary in an end of
the year like annual report and we all
wait for it it's like you know for us
Geeks and nerds it's very exciting when
we see how does he see what happened in
the last year I wonder now if you were
speculating or you were running a sports
book you might think in a year where we
had an immunity decision that upset the
balance of power and the three co-equal
branches of government you had a Supreme
Court Justice who who along with his
wife flew flags of insurrection in front
of their homes um you had millions of
dollars of undisclosed gifts I would
call them bribes going to Clarence
Thomas you had Sam Alo falling in love
with monarchists all around the world
and bringing that into his jurist
Prudence uh you would think that maybe
all the ethical crisis maybe he would
talk about that nope no so Alex and Lisa
it was the four threats I thought this
was going to be like the Four Freedoms
of Eisenhower or whatever like the four
threats against the independent
Judiciary most of which looked like an
indictment of Donald
Trump uh without calling it by name and
then this last one about his real fear
is that the incoming Trump
Administration is really going to be
Lawless because he made it so and won't
respect any of the Judiciary decrees
that are coming out from the and then
where are we so why don't let me turn it
over to you guys you guys read it cover
to cover so did I with all the beautiful
pictures and pro prosaic statements
pictures of Earl Warren and and ren
whoever else was in there I don't know
what was in there to try to give it
legitimacy what what why am I so hot
about this Lisa I'm gonna let you kick
it off I've been you know checking out
some of the comments on our videos one
comment or observe that it seems like
Alex in our in just in our few months of
doing these videos with you poak that
Alex's uh beard is getting grayer and
grayer by the day and it is reports like
this that is doing that I'm I'm GNA let
Lisa kick us up because she is the she
is the I started this channel three
months ago and mine was darker than
yours now look at
me my husband like the president it's
the president's the president overtime
effect my husband who I met when he was
19 says he didn't have any gray hair
until he met me which is true but it
came much it came much later um no
thanks Alex thanks for passing a ton of
me so um as as Michael said this is the
annual report of the Chief Justice and
we knew it was going to be a
whitewashing job that's why Alex and I
uh through Court accountability um and
our tilted scales newsletter got out of
prebuttal because we knew that Roberts
was going to continue his PR campaign
ignore reality and try to spend things
which is what he's now really thankfully
now he's really finally known for it for
the longest time he had the highest
approval rating of all the officials in
Washington it was really discouraging to
see that given the role that he's played
in really destroying fundamental areas
of the law voting rights uh uh the maps
Fair Maps um the the campaign Finance
decisions in s United and more um and so
now finally over these last two years um
The Mask has fallen and people can
really see what John Roberts is up to
and then to have him issue this report
um which you know really ignores you
know basic ignores what actually
happened in terms of the plummeting
support for the court and why it's
happening instead he attempts to um in
some ways equate criticism with almost
terrorism or threats to judges I think
it's it's um and Alex I'd love for you
to talk about this I think it's
fundamentally an authoritarian response
by this chief justice because instead of
actually acknowledging the reality which
is that this court has faced an an Inc
incredibly um uh incredibly compelling
just depiction in the media of how it
has gone off the rails instead of
responding to that um John Roberts
basically tries to say the courts are
under attack and there's illegitimate
criticism of the Court um and in fact
what there's been is finally a light
shining on the court and the actual
corruption that has surrounded that
court has been documented by journalists
um numerous journalists and and instead
of addressing that which he refused to
do refused to appear before the
Judiciary Committee and more instead he
wants to criticize the critics so um
what do you what do you think about that
Alex yeah I think that's exactly right
and popac I think you're on the on the
nail too in terms of um some messages
he's very clearly trying to to send to
Trump let's walk through these four
threats that he he describes as four
areas of illegitimate activity uh they
violence intimidation disinformation and
threats to defy lawfully entered
judgments in and he walks through a
number of very scary incidents of
violence that have um involved judges um
of course there was um a really horrific
Massacre of a judge's family uh in New
Jersey that led to vital legislation
bipartisan legislation that I helped
work on when I was in the Senate uh to
improve security for judges um and then
you know I think the intimidation
arguments are you know Le certainly less
um less fles fled out and then as you
say Lisa he makes he sort of makes this
transition to this third category
disinformation of which he gives zero
examples uh and here he makes the very
clear uh connection between what he's
saying is an illegitimate criticism of
the court and he says this actually he
says that uh public officials who
regrettably engaged in recent attempts
to intimidate judges for example
suggesting political bias in the judge's
adverse rulings without a credible basis
for for such Al allegations I mean that
itself is is disinformation and I think
it speaks to the extent to which you
know John Roberts really views himself
and his colleagues there his Republican
colleagues at the court as the only
source of legitimacy um and the idea
that uh leveling criticism public
criticism of these justices of their
rulings their facially unsound uh
unprincipled rulings with proven
connections to corrupt partisan activity
to part to corrupt uh fiscal sponsorship
of the justices Lifestyles to say that
they are illegitimate to say that they
are without basis in evidence uh is is
itself an act of disinformation and then
to take the further step of suggesting
as Roberts does that it's it's these uh
these criticisms that have led to the to
the violence to the intimidation against
judges is is really beyond the pale and
and ging to to my mind I mean without
any acknowledgement of the underlying
conduct without any uh any uh
self-awareness at all of the examples
you mentioned popac the the the flags
that alo alo was wearing outside of his
house or the many millions of dollars
and gifts that Clarence Thomas received
from billionaires with interests before
the court um as if those outcomes as if
outcomes like dos and the stripping away
of uh women's fundamental freedoms in
this country were not you know itself a
part of this heightened politicization
height heightened polarization around
the courts uh is is really I think uh
you know reflects this air of arrogance
and impunity that the court has has
really started to manif I'll put I I'll
go further if a company issued an annual
report like this ignoring all the
material facts of what happened to it or
what it caused during the prior year
they would be um both indicted and sued
for Securities fraud right right right
okay that right you'd be like what I
wonder what happened at the Supreme
Court Incorporated oh that's interesting
and and everything that I read I'm going
to read a couple of parts of it most of
it was was apparently a a thinly veiled
criticism of Donald Trump and what keeps
what seems to be keeping um Roberts up
at night is that he created a leviathan
he created a rampaging Frankenstein that
he can't control and he's worried is
going to flout any of the orders that he
doesn't like into the future because in
order for this thing to work as he
pointed to Little Rock and Brown versus
the Board of Education and desegregation
in order for this to work the executive
branch has to recognize and execute on
the orders of the court because the
court doesn't have its own cops the
court doesn't have its own police John
Roberts says do that he doesn't have
like an army to go and go do it you need
an FBI director you need Department of
Justice attorney general who's that
going to be cash Patel Pam Bondi who you
know uh uh uh harit Dylan for civil
rights who I know we all laugh at that
but and I know harit from a case but
yeah no so the answer is no and he's
worried about that so listen to some of
these I'm gonna skip all of the oil
painting stuff you know the Renoir
Masters the oil painting stuff the
introduction the Illusions to King
George and his declaration that the
courts you know were going to serve at
the pleasure of the king you know he's
he's claiming that as the threat upon
which he just created that I know
exactly he just created the thing that
we ran from it's it's astounding yeah I
have no doubt I've said this aloud if we
were able to do a seance with the
framers and the founding fathers exume
them and told them and laid out what
just happened at the United States
Supreme Court and otherwise they would
say say what I mean I don't know I don't
really know what the colonial
verbiage what the just happened
okay and so here's what he said on some
of and I also think he's prejudged the
Tik Tock case which Lisa and I are gonna
talk about later because he made a
comment about he's worried about foreign
misinformation campaigns and it's impact
he says on the Judiciary but I don't
know that doesn't sound great for Tik
Tok on on the 10th of of January but
here's here's what he said and every
time I read it I was like this is Trump
um today in the computer era
intimidation can take different forms of
the Judiciary disappointed litigant rage
at judicial decisions on the internet
urging readers to send a message to the
judge they falsely claim the judge had
it in for them because of the judge's
race gender or ethnicity or the
political party of the president who
appointed the judge some of them
encourage some messages promote violence
for example setting things on fire or
blowing them up I'm like well which
person in the last year or two has done
that and his name is not Joe Biden it's
not Menendez it's not Hunter Biden it's
it's Donald Trump he goes on and says
public officials regrettably have
engaged in attempts to intimidate judges
yes I agree about their adverse rulings
so he it's not like they they they can't
write that nothing's accidental right
nothing's a slip of the pen or the
fingers so it's there on purpose so he
he's basically trying in his own way to
say we see you Donald Trump we see your
attacks on the Judiciary and we don't
like it while he's on the other at the
start of it insulting the American
people's intelligence and telling us
we're not bright enough or good enough
to criticize the
Judiciary right he doesn't just say in
the beginning he says well the first
amendment allows you to do it but then
he basically says that um uh a lot of
this
interference let me see if I get the
exact quote here
unfortunately love this here we go this
is on page uh five unfortunately not all
actors that's you and me engage in
informed criticism or anything remotely
resembling it I feel compelled to
address I mean so that's a criticism of
the American people criticizing the
Judiciary right um and then he just goes
on and on so what what if you're trying
to be a a psychologist for the psychos
that has overcome Roberts what do you
make of him talking about his abuser in
the way in the language that he's using
in Donald Trump and what is that
supposed to be telling us about where
the court is at when it comes to cases
and there's going to be dozens of them
in front of the court in 2025 and 2026
as we watch a lawless president Lurch
from one constitutional crisis to the
next well you know I think I think that
um Roberts has cleverly written that
response on sort of two different um
villanes one is you know about Trump but
one is also about the Democrats how dare
um the house members you know file a a a
bill of impeachment or the Baseline
resolution for impeachment how dare they
write letters to the court and say these
justices Alo and Thomas should recuse
themselves obviously they are in
violation of long-standing federal
statute that mandates with mandatory
language that a Justice shall recuse
themselves if they have a bias or
there's an appearance of bias and yet he
doesn't address those things at all
because he needed those votes to do what
he did which was to basically hand the
presidency to Donald Trump what what
John Roberts orchestrated this this past
year in 2024 through three different uh
Supreme Court decisions the Colorado
case the immunity case and the fiser
case involving the charges against some
of the people who attacked the Capital
fans of Trump trying to stop the
Electoral College account what Robert
signal to the American people was that
Trump did nothing wrong that he did
nothing that would bar him from the
presidency that his followers also did
not violate the law in some specific
ways and that he himself could not that
Trump could not violate the law um it
was an extraordinary extraordinary
partisan act I think probably the most
partisan act in our history even Beyond
Bush Vore in its own way because it not
only settled in essence uh or basically
set the path for this election but it
changed the rules until we can revoke
them for for Trump and any future
president president to have this
immunity and in the face of that this
man Chief Justice John Roberts dares to
cite concern about King George when he
created a king in Trump retroactively
and prospectively I don't know what the
oath is even GNA mean on January 20th
When Donald Trump swears on a Bible to
uphold and defend this constitution a
constitution that John Roberts has said
he cannot VI you know basically he
cannot commit a crime if he violates it
if he transgresses it even though as
John Roberts knows well and your our
listeners know well the Constitution
provides that the duty of a president is
to Faithfully execute the law John
Roberts waved Donald Trump you know
waved that away almost like a pardon and
yet he comes out with this just um
disingenuous yearend report in which
he's you know focused on you know
claiming that people who criticize the
court are acting illegitimately that
they are acting without facts when in
fact this Supreme Court Court this 6 to3
over and over and over again again court
has made partisan ruling after partisan
ruling in favor of their political party
without any humility without any
restraint and so he wants to pretend
that the court is nonpartisan despite
all evidence the contrary and then the
last thing I'm G to say on this rant is
he has the audacity to complain that
supposedly his opponents you know aren't
recognizing the Court's rules of cases
and controversies and standing to Sue
when in fact over and over this Roberts
Court has basically manufactured
standing in order to issue rulings like
in the student loan case that defy
longstanding rules about standing this
court the Roberts Court has manufactured
fat so much so that the desent had to
put a photograph like one of the first
photographs ever in a Supreme Court
decision to show what actually happened
in the prayer case in that football case
because the majority opinion was filled
with lies and so I shouldn't be
surprised John Roberts issues a yearend
opinion that a year-end you know
pronouncement in essence that is sort of
filled in its way with its with its own
lies as you mentioned Alex this idea
that what what the criticism of him is
misinformation or disinformation but the
fact is that he's still the chief just
of the United States and he feels that
he can act with impunity and he ends on
the Note reinforcing Mar versus Madison
that it's the Court's job to say what
the law is yeah except this court is
inventing what the law is yeah Alex Goes
Lisa you know what we call a rant that
goes 30 minutes or longer a podcast a
podcast okay okay go ahead note to self
note to self no no that's a good thing I
meant that as a compliment okay yeah I
mean I'm I'm glad you ended with that
that invocation of Mary versus Madison
um which established the the principle
of judicial review the ability of the
Supreme Court to look at a law of
Congress and decide that it should be
superseded by the Constitution and that
the con the con Constitution could
invalidate laws of course you're right
Lisa they've completely Rewritten the
Constitution and so now they are you
know they're not just engaging in
judicial review they're engaging in
absolute judicial Supremacy to the
extent that they are deciding all
questions of Law and policy in our
country which goes back to this I think
really important um dichotomy through
which to look at judicial power look at
the Constitutional framework John
Roberts in in 2009 in a C-SPAN interview
talked about how you know what makes the
courts different from other branches is
that we're not political and that if
people don't like what we do that's more
or less just too bad and I think the
other side of that you know the other
side of that um question is is really
encapsulated brilliantly by Abraham
Lincoln when he had his first inaugural
inaugural
address responding really to to Dread
Scott um where he saided citizen must
confess that if the policy of the
government upon the vital questions
affecting the whole people is to be
irrevocably fixed by the decisions of
the Supreme Court the people will have
ceased to be their own rulers and you
know if you can see the two different
worldviews encompassed in those quotes
and we're very much living in John
Roberts's world right now it's more or
less just too bad and we've acceded to
this idea that the court should decide
all these questions and so to your
question popac about you know how do we
you know unravel what's happening in
this Twisted mind
of the Chief Justice of the United
States I think the way to think about it
is how can he preserve maximum power uh
as there's this push and poll as he's
got this unpredictable chaotic president
that he's empowered that he's put back
in office through his ruling on the on
on the immunity case and I think looking
at that decision and looking at the the
travel of that case and the other cases
Lisa mentioned implicating Trump through
throughout this year it was very clear
that they were trying to help Trump get
reelected they saw that as the most
viable path to maintaining as much power
as they could to completing what we very
much view as a constitutional
counterrevolution to overturn the
economic and social progress of the 20th
century and now that Trump has indeed uh
you know uh won re-election and is
preparing to reassume the presidency he
recognizes that Trump and his chaos and
his complete disregard for norms and
constitutional law and the status quo uh
again poses a threat to him and so he's
I think planting this marker right this
say you know you can't defy our opinions
we're you know we're the ones that get
to decide if you don't like what we say
it's more or less just too bad yeah and
so what what I think is that there needs
to be a paradigm shift Al that's a
hacked word that gets used a little bit
too much but about how and you're you're
writing briefs right now you're writing
some amicus briefs right now but the way
that constitutional scholarship happens
at the court and the way briefs are
written I think has to change
fundamentally in or right we can't keep
we can't keep doing what we did in the
past and expect a different result
because that's the definition of
insanity and so there has to be a more
Artful way to use arguments taken from
and and resonating with the six in the
majority to try to get them and peel one
or two off on key issues in the coming
terms the one thing we know about the
writings of the chief justice is that um
you can take these things and all the
other things he's ever said at oral
argument and in your own it wouldn't be
AI it would just be I your own
intelligence right put this into new
strategies and new ways of making
arguments that will be successful um you
and what do you think I mean we have to
do that don't we I think yes and and
also right I think we definitely have to
do that and there will be opportunities
to drive wedge to to you know to H have
this majority defy Trump uh in some of
the the most extreme of these uh project
2025 plans I think for example the the
argument that these guys Russ vot and
Mark petta and others are pedalling
about the invalidity of the empowerment
Control Act and inherent empowerment
powers of the president I think there's
a very good chance that the the court
majority would would not go for those
even if they agree with substantively
where they're going there uh and so I
think there there'll be lots of
opportunities and we need to look for
opportunities to exploit those wedges
but but I think beyond that what we need
to do and I think that filing briefs is
a good way to do that although less less
to persuade the court than to persuade
the public um is to make a political
argument about who should have power in
this country that we should be our own
rulers that that John Roberts and his
buddies Sam Alo and Clarence Thomas and
Amy Coney Barrett and the rest they
shouldn't be the ones that get to decide
all these questions at the end of the
day and that I think requires a much
bigger paradigm shift in terms of how
lawyers in particular think about
engaging with the judicial process
because we've always just accepted this
idea that the courts decide what the
Constitution means and that's the end of
the story but there's a long history and
tradition in this country of you know of
other people other important actors the
president the congress the people
themselves having a real voice in
declaring and deciding constitutional
meaning uh and that's I think the
direction we need to head to have a
chance to overcome this court majority
because at the end of the day even if we
succeed in stopping Trump here or there
on on certain policy questions or things
he tries tries to do the agenda that
this durably entrenched Supreme Court
majority is driving forward is one that
is uh inimical to democracy it's an
inimical to progress and so we need to
confront that as well yeah I want to
talk more on future sort of episodes of
this about that last point you just
raised which is the stakeholders in
democracy other than the Supreme Court
having a voice and a say about what the
Constitution means and how and what does
that look like what's the Contours and
shape of that going forward because I'm
sure our listeners and followers are
very interested because they are uh much
to John Robert CH they they are informed
they are um educated and they do have
legitimate criticism but they feel like
they're left out of the conversation
because of the way as you said John
Roberts has fashion these three branches
of government the role of the Supreme
Court so can we do that again talk about
that and that's what we're about at
court accountability that's that's sort
of the the the thrust of the all the
work we try to do from you know all the
research and the communications and the
advocacy mentioned the brief uh that
we're preparing to file uh it's all sort
of intended to help empower the American
people to have an ownership stake in
constitutional meaning Lisa anything
else on as a final word I think that's
exactly right and the thing that the
other thing about this court it's not
just that it's the Roberts Court and he
and they you know in essence are out of
control this 63 faction but never in our
history has a court been constructed in
this way um in my lifetime uh so since
1967 uh 75% of the justices put on
Supreme Court were put on there by
Republican presidents and most of those
justices actually followed the president
before them but now we have six who were
basically chosen in order to reverse our
rights to reverse those precedents and
um and in fact at one point there were
like I think 11 Republican appointments
in a row to the US Supreme Court because
it skipped Carter it was like Nixon you
know Ford Reagan Reagan Bush and so they
have had this court this whole time but
only in this most recent period under
Roberts have they had a court that
finally was chosen handpicked to
basically reward our rights and install
this Republican um IDE ideology
as binding law on the rest of us and so
I there there are real questions in a
democracy about the legitimacy of what
happened how we got here and the
imperative the moral imperative that we
not give in that we do something about
it because this is not how a democracy
should function with an out ofcontrol
Court rewriting our rights cutting words
out of the Constitution and enthroning
someone like Donald Trump as a near King
that is antithetical to what it means to
live in a Democratic Republic under our
constitution I can't wait to be with
court accountability action throughout
2025 as we rigorously hold Donald Trump
and the federal Judiciary accountable we
can only do that through these kind of
conversations where we always try to end
not on a high note but on a note of a
path of what we can do to make the
change that is necessary in order to
restore legitimacy to our constitutional
republic and I can't think of two better
people from for me to be kicking these
things and spitballing with and Alex
Aronson and Lisa uh Graves of Court
accountability action we're going to be
doing these regularly we all sort of
pinky swore committed that we're going
to be doing more of these together and
together and with even other
contributors within the world and the
ecosystem of Court accountability action
into 2025 so we'll be announcing those
things as we go along so until our next
hot take and I'm going to be doing one
soon with Lisa about uh we're going to
talk about The Tick Tock upcoming or
argument and the weirdo Lawless brief
filed by the soon Tobe solicitor general
on behalf of the Pres not even
president-elect um uh as a a drive by
stranger to the Tik Tock case and what
and what to make right and what to make
I'll send in
one why not I mean okay so there you are
so we'll talk about that in another hot
s in the meantime Court accountability
action legal AF signing off in
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