JUSTICE KENNEDY ANNOUNCES RETIREMENT | Predictions for Possible Replacements | What This Might Mean For Roe
June 28, 2018
YEP, IT REALLY HAPPENED
|In case you somehow missed it, JUSTICE ANTHONY KENNEDY announced his retirement yesterday and shook the earth to its core. For thirty years the Sacramento native has shaped the Supreme Court’s most consequential decisions. But as of July 31, he will step down and allow for PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP to pick his replacement.
AMERICA UNDER ANTHONY
|Eric Levenson and Emanuella Grinberg with CNN, as well as Joe Palazzolo with WSJ, take a look at the JUSTICE KENNEDY-authored decisions that changed America. They include Planned Parenthood v. Casey, Roper v. Simmons and, of course, Citizens United v. FEC.
NO TIME LIKE THE PRESENT
|Although JUSTICE KENNEDY’S announcement may have come as a surprise to most, it doesn’t mean we weren’t all ready for it. This means we can already start looking at lists of names and get to know the potentials who may get the nod from the president. CNN’s Ariane de Vogue and Eli Watkins take an early whack at it, sharing with us a list of possible nominees DONALD TRUMP may already be mulling.
SWING SWING FROM THE TANGLES OF MY HEART
|So with Kennedy gone, who’s going to be the next swing vote on SCOTUS? The folks over at FiveThirtyEight have their money on CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS. Check out their predictions for how the median Supreme Court justice might shift, and their note on which possible Supreme Court nominee has the potential to snatch the swing vote from Roberts.
STEP RIGHT UP, TAKE YOUR PICK
|Zoe Tillman with Buzzfeed also looks into who PRESIDENT TRUMP may pick as Kennedy’s replacement, resurrecting the list of 25 names the then-nominee had shared with the public during his 2016 campaign. She notes, “There are a few clues as to where the White House might be leaning as far as nominees to replace Kennedy. In the past year and a half, Trump has gotten a number of state supreme court justices on his list confirmed to seats on the federal appeals courts, a common launching pad for future Supreme Court justices.”
I DON'T WANNA DIE FOR THEM TO MISS ME
|Without Kennedy, it’s natural to wonder what his absence will mean for critical issues such as abortion, affirmative action and even the Supreme Court itself. CNN’s Joan Biskupic digs into some of the big questions of the day, including what will happen to Roe v. Wade and same-sex marriage.
IT'S OVER, IT'S OVER
|Mark Joseph Stern with Slate doesn’t mince words when he lends his prediction for what will happen without JUSTICE KENNEDY on the bench: “Soon, perhaps within the next two years, the U.S. Supreme Court will overturn Roe v. Wade. It might not admit what it’s doing. It might cloak its reversal in minimalist rhetoric and even pretend to adhere to Roe. But the upshot will be the same. After DONALD TRUMP replaces Justice Anthony Kennedy, the court’s new conservative majority will allow states to outlaw abortion.”
TAKING A TURN
|In The Boston Globe, Erwin Chemerinsky opines that although SCOTUS just completed its most conservative term in recent memory, the court is going to take a hard turn even further to the right after Kennedy leaves.
WANT IT DONE YESTERDAY
|Republicans have been ready for JUSTICE KENNEDY to retire for a while now, so they’re not planning on wasting any time securing his replacement. Top Republicans said yesterday that they’re ready to install a new justice before the November elections. Seung Min Kim and Josh Dawsey with The Washington Post report on the story.
TAKE YOUR SWEET, SWEET TIME
|Do Democrats have any options when it comes to thwarting a Supreme Court nominee from DONALD TRUMP? Jennifer Rubin explains in The Washington Post that Democrats’ best bet is to delay delay delay. Rubin: “There are certain delaying tactics senators could take, and while those tactics only slow down the process but do not stop it, there are myriad things that can happen between now and the time a new Congress is sworn in. Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III may release a report that suggests grounds for impeachment and/or indictment, thereby calling into grave question the legitimacy of a Trump nominee. Senators may vacate their seats for health or other reasons. In short, senators could take as much time as humanly possible both to fully vet nominees and to head off election-eve votes.”
END OF AN ERA
|Is JUSTICE KENNEDY the last of the small-town lawyers? Garrett Epps writing in The Atlantic sure seems to think so. The Sacramento native — a fellow Land Park kid, no less — leaves the Supreme Court at a time in which his departure marks the end of an era. Epps says Kennedy “will almost certainly be the last justice to come from a legal world that has now all but vanished — the decorous, Atticus Finch-style 20th-century life of the small-town, general-practice lawyer, who saw life from many legal angles and formed a bulwark of American communities in all 50 states.”
NEVER SPENT A CHRISTMAS IN SACRAMENTO
|The Sacramento Bee reacted to the news of JUSTICE KENNEDY’S retirement like the rest of the country, though with a little more focus on what this may mean for the tiny town in the heart of California. Sam Stanton and Darrell Smith write that although the justice loves his hometown, it’s unlikely he’ll retire in the City of Trees. Marcos Bretón also notes that the Sacramento that shaped Kennedy throughout much of his life is long gone by now. “Kennedy, who, at 81, announced his retirement Wednesday, grew more conservative than the city that raised him and celebrates him still. But Sacramento has fundamentally changed from the Sacramento that formed Kennedy. That old Sacramento is fading. It was a capital with a more conservative strain. It was more reserved, more homogeneous, more structured by a social pecking order.”
OTHER NEWS
Week's Events Draw Deeper Partisan Lines
The Wall Street Journal“Thus, the pot is boiling at a time when the country already is deeply divided in its views of President Donald Trump, the Senate is nearly evenly divided between the two parties, and the Supreme Court is split between liberal and conservative blocs. Little wonder, then, that political anxieties are running high.”
Conservatives Say The Looming Supreme Court Battle Boosts Their Midterm Prospects
USA Today“The looming confirmation battle over Kennedy’s replacement already has galvanized Republican and Democratic activists. Conservative groups that came together last year for a $17 million campaign to confirm Justice Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s first Supreme Court nominee, have prepped for months behind the scenes for this potential vacancy.”
Control Of The Senate Just Became That Much More Important. Here Is Where Things Stand.
The Washington Post“Thanks to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-Ky.) finagling during the fight to confirm Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, Supreme Court nominees are not subject to the filibuster, meaning that only 51 votes are needed to confirm. Unfortunately for McConnell, though, that’s exactly how many votes he has. If he loses one vote, the Senate is split 50-50, and Vice President Pence can cast the tiebreaker.”