Trump issues statement of support for Justice Barrett

Over the last few weeks, Trump-appointed Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett has been under fire from MAGA and some conservatives.  

After much was made about a “look” she gave Trump during his joint session address, Trump made a statement that I am sure will shock many of his supporters.  

The Right’s building problem 

Believe me, Democrats and the media are playing this up for all its worth. Barrett is clearly taking a lead from Justice Roberts, and she appears to lean on him heavily during rulings, which is not always good for Donald Trump.  

Every time she rules with Roberts when he crosses the aisle, something is made of it, challenging if Trump made the right decision by nominating her in the first place. 

For example, in March, The New York Times published a report titled, “Amy Coney Barrett and the Right’s Elite-Building Problem.” 

Now, I have stated repeatedly that while I do not always like the rulings from this court, I do believe they are getting most things right. I have also stated that even though this is a 6-3 tilt toward conservatives, I think this is the most balanced court we have had in decades.  

The look 

Last week, Barrett sided with Roberts and the three liberal justices regarding the ruling to unfreeze the USAID payments. Conservatives were furious, but the ruling was actually correct. However, I think few people complaining about the ruling actually read the full text of the ruling.  

In that ruling, Roberts noted that the deadline for the lower court ruling had passed, so they were kicking the case back down to the lower courts to let the court establish a timeline and exactly what payments had to be made. Then, if the administration still wanted to fight the case, it could refile. This was in line with precedents on other cases that the Court had kicked back down. Once that deadline is passed, for all intents and purposes, the challenge is void, and that was the point being made by Roberts in his majority opinion.  

This led to the joint session address, when much was made of the look given to Trump by Barrett, but it was only a small snippet of the interaction. The video that blew up online was after Trump and Barrett had greeted each other and was a one-second snip of a glance.  

One reaction to the video that was posted was, "Trump may have appointed Amy Coney Barrett, but she looks like she couldn't despise him more in this clip." That was typical of what people were saying about her, but then it got worse. People were calling her a DEI hire, but that would have been a shot against Trump, not Barrett. Regardless, I thought everyone was overreacting and said as much in my report on the video.  

A Good Woman 

If you noticed, Trump has never criticized Barrett for a single decision she made in his cases—not a word.  

So, when his supporters started going after her, I was curious to see if Trump would pile on and express regret over selecting her or back her up, and he did the latter. 

After vicious attacks were launched against Barrett by Trump’s biggest backers in the conservative media world, Trump stated, “She’s a very good woman. She’s very smart, and I don’t know about people attacking her, I really don’t know. I think she’s a very good woman. She’s very smart.” 

I really am hoping this quiets down the criticism of Barrett because I do like her approach to the law and quite honestly, a moderate is a good thing for the bench, not bad. We have two hardliners on our side already, and that is also important, but we need different perspectives from a conservative standpoint, and again, while I don’t always agree with her, I think Barrett is a very important addition to this bench.