July 29, 2024
President Biden wants huge changes made to the Supreme Court and to the Office of the President and he’s asking Congress and you to get on board with his new three-part plan.
Part one – the President is proposing term limits for Supreme Court justices. As you know – under the current system Supreme Court members are appointed and in essence sit on the court for life. For the record – that’s not technically in the constitution. All the constitution says is – Supreme Court justices shall serve during “good behaviour” which has been interpreted to mean – lifetime appointment. But now – president Biden wants Congress to pass a law to change that interpretation. He is suggesting a system where every President gets to appoint a justice every two years. And that justice will then sit on the supreme court bench for 18 years and then will cycle out.
Part two – President Biden is suggesting a binding code of ethics should be established for the justices. As I have been reporting for at least a year now, there is no official code of ethics for the Supreme Court. And the loose rules they do have are enforced by the justices themselves. If they choose to. All other federal judges have a binding code of ethics that is enforceable. President Biden says the Supreme Court should be held to the same standard. He wants congress to pass a law that establishes an ethics code forcing disclosure of gifts, refraining from public political activity and recusal rules when ..a.. Justice and his or her spouse have financial or other conflicts of interest in a case.
And part three — Biden wants no immunity for crimes a former President committed while in office. As you know the Supreme Court just ruled that not only are presidents immune from prosecution from civil lawsuits – they’re now also immune from any criminal act they take while in office as long as that act was part of the president’s official duties. By the way that has never been allowed in the history of this country. Well – according to Biden’s proposal he wants an amendment called the “no one is above the law amendment” added to the United States constitution. He says that would ensures no president get any immunity from federal criminal indictment, trial, conviction or sentencing simply because he or she was the president for four or eight years.
Now – don’t get too excited about any of these proposals. This whole proposal is an uphill battle. Republican House and Senate leadership say these proposals are “dead on arrival” and a consitutional amendment is next to impossible in this current political environment. To get that done, Biden would need to get a two-thirds vote in both the house and the senate and three-fourths of the states must also ratify it.
Read the proposal here.
