Justices Approach One Year Of Remote Arguments | FBI Under Fire For Its Handling Of Kavanaugh Investigation
March 17, 2021
NEVER FORGET THE FLUSH
|“Lawyers arguing in jeans and hoodies. A justice who has been silent for years regularly talking. A sound like a toilet flushing during the discussion of a case. Arguments at the Supreme Court have looked and sounded a lot different over the past year since the justices closed their marble-columned courtroom to the public and began hearing cases by telephone because of the coronavirus pandemic.” Jessica Gresko with the Associated Press reports on the year of the Supreme Court’s remote oral arguments — which has notably included live audio streaming for the public. The pandemic forced justices to rethink some of their traditions in order to keep the business of their docket moving. Since their first phone arguments in May, much more has changed at SCOTUS beyond justices’ means of hosting arguments. JUSTICE RUTH BADER GINSBURG is gone, JUSTICE CLARENCE THOMAS has gotten chatty, and the institution didn’t melt down because it became more transparent.
THOUGHT THEY'D FORGET, HUH?
|Last Thursday, SENATOR SHELDON WHITEHOUSE sent a letter to ATTORNEY GENERAL MERRICK GARLAND asking his Justice Department to support the Senate’s review of the FBI’s 2018 investigation into sexual assault allegations against BRETT KAVANAUGH. The Democratic senator alleges the FBI’s background investigation of the now-justice was fake. Whitehouse wrote in his letter, “In this matter the shutters were closed, the bridge drawn up, and there was no point of entry by which members of the public or Congress could provide information to the FBI.”
WHO'S IN CHARGE HERE
|Stephanie Kirchgaessner with The Guardian notes the FBI was supposed to investigate allegations of sexual assault and misconduct against BRETT KAVANAUGH during his Senate confirmation process. But some have said the FBI of conducted an incomplete check — especially since neither Kavanaugh nor his primary accuser, DR. CHRISTINE BLASEY FORD, were interviewed as part of the inquiry. “Among the concerns listed in Whitehouse’s letter to Garland are allegations that some witnesses who wanted to share their accounts with the FBI could not find anyone at the bureau who would accept their testimony and that it had not assigned any individual to accept or gather evidence.”
HOW DARE THEY DO THE MATH
|In an interview with Fox News yesterday, former president DONALD TRUMP blasted the Supreme Court for lacking the “courage” to overturn the 2020 election results. Once again, Trump suggested the election was stolen from him because states expanded mail-in voting due to the pandemic. Jonathan Easley with The Hill reports, “Trump lost scores of court challenges, and his own Justice Department disputed the idea that there was widespread fraud in the election. However, the former president on Tuesday unloaded on the courts for refusing to throw out Democratic votes in states that changed their election laws to expand access to voting.”
POD DU JOUR
|On a recent episode of Amicus, the Slate podcast hosted by Dahlia Lithwick, Jessica Ring Amunson joins for a conversation about the voting rights case she argued at SCOTUS earlier this month. Brnovich v. DNC revolves around the “results test” in Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act which is meant to measure whether an election law results in disproportionate disenfranchisement of minority voters.