Exclusive: GOP Sen Makes Bold Prediction About Supreme Court Makeup If Trump Wins in 2020
Sen. Steve Daines of Montana believes if President Donald Trump wins a second term it will mean a majority of Republican-appointed judges on all the nation’s circuit courts and a super-majority on the Supreme Court.
In a recent interview with The Western Journal, Daines said Trump’s impact on the judiciary could be one of his most profound legacies.
“I think one of the other very important issues that’s up for grabs in 2020 will be what happens to the courts longer term,” he said. “President Trump working with the Republican Senate is transforming the courts in this country.”
“That is a legacy that will truly protect this nation from tyranny in the event the left took over the presidency or Congress,” the senator argued.
The Washington Times reported Trump has successfully appointed 43 appeals court judges to date.
By way of comparison, Barack Obama had placed 10 appeals court judges at this point in his presidency.
Trump’s most recent appointment, Judge Peter Phipps, was to the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears appeals from Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The president flipped the 3rd Circuit to a majority of GOP-appointed judges in March, according to The Times.
Daines said Trump will likely be able to flip all the circuit courts of appeal by the end of a second term.
The senator noted that Trump has already significantly reshaped the 9th Circuit by appointing seven judges.
The current make up is 12 GOP appointed judges to 16 Democratic ones.
The 9th is the largest circuit overseeing Daines’ native Montana, as well as Alaska, Arizona, California, Guam, Hawaii, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington state.
The “Nutty Ninth” has a reputation for being the most liberal in the country and has been overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court over 75 percent of the time.
In addition to reshaping the circuit courts, a Trump second term could result in a 7-to-2, GOP-appointed majority on the Supreme Court.
The court is presently 5-to-4, but the two oldest justices are Ruth Bader Ginsburg (86 years old) and Stephen Breyer (80), both former President Bill Clinton appointees.
Ginsburg, who overcame a recent health scare, told an audience last summer she could see herself staying on the court until she is at least 90, pointing to her former colleague Justice John Paul Stevens, who retired at that age.
That would put her squarely in the middle of a Trump second term. Breyer has not hinted when he would like to step down from the bench.
Thomas Jipping, a senior legal fellow with The Heritage Foundation, told The Western Journal that there are of course “a lot of variables” in assessing whether Daines’ predictions for the circuit courts and the Supreme Court will come to pass.
Federal judgeships are lifelong appointments. So, “it’s impossible to know with any confidence” exactly how everything will shake out by the end of a potential Trump second term.
Jipping agreed with Daines’ assessment that the type of judges the president is appointing — originalists and textualists — will serve as a bulwark against tyranny, because of their fidelity to the Constitution.
“Our system of government was designed to work in a particular way, the separation of powers, federalism, Congress only exercising enumerated powers, judges only having the power of interpretation to decide individual cases,” the legal expert said.
“So that if you have a judiciary that is more faithful to the way it was designed to function,” Jipping continued, “[that] is protection against tyranny.”
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