Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, took to the Senate floor Thursday in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in DHS v. Regents of the University of California, that essentially held that a president cannot use an executive action to override a previous president’s executive action.
The court rejected President Trump’s effort to end the legal protections granted by former President Obama to young immigrants brought here illegally by their parents.
"Obama's executive amnesty was illegal the day it was issued and not one single justice of the nine Supreme Court justices disputed that," Cruz said. "Not a one. Chief Justice Roberts wrote the majority opinion joined by the four liberal justices on the Court. This is becoming a pattern."
He concluded, "This decision today was lawless, it was gamesmanship, and it was contrary to the judicial oath that each of the nine justices has taken."
Carrie Severino, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Judicial Crisis Network, also condemned the decision. Today, Chief Justice Roberts strikes again," she began. "In a 5-4 opinion written by the Chief, the Court demonstrates that it is willing to change its standard of review of executive action when the president is named Trump."
Severino continued, "This is nothing more than a double standard. It should have been straightforward that the Trump administration had the discretion to take executive action to undo executive action that was unlawful from the start."
After referring to a court decision last year denying the Trump administration’s attempt to return a former standard citizenship question into the 2020 census, she concluded, "Chief Justice Roberts once again has failed to stand up for the institutional interests of the Court by allowing it to be weaponized for partisan ends."
The week started out with the court’s denial of certiorari (refusal to review) 10 important Second Amendment cases, prompting Justice Clarence Thomas, the most reliable conservative voice on the court, to draft a scathing 19-page dissent.
In one of the cases, a New Jersey man and former crime victim who services ATMs in high crime areas applied for and was denied a concealed carry permit, prompting him to sue the state of New Jersey.
Justice Thomas believed that New Jersey’s requirement that an applicant must first demonstrate a need to carry a firearm before being permitted to do so was a “near-total prohibition” of a Second Amendment right.
"One would think that such an onerous burden on a fundamental right would warrant this Court’s review," he said. "But today, faced with a petition challenging just such a restriction on citizens' Second Amendment rights, the Court simply looks the other way."
Thomas also wondered how the court might respond if the state were to require a showing of need in order to exercise other constitutionally-protected rights.
"This Court would almost certainly review the constitutionality of a law requiring citizens to establish a justifiable need before exercising their free speech rights," he argued. "And it seems highly unlikely that the Court would allow a State to enforce a law requiring a woman to provide a justifiable need before seeking an abortion."
Also on Monday and as a final insult to the Constitution, the court essentially rewrote Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to grant rights that neither Congress nor then-President Lyndon B. Johnson ever intended.
Sen. Cruz also addressed that decision:
"We saw earlier this week a decision rewriting Title VII of our civil rights laws," he said. "Rewriting Title VII, the prohibition on sex discrimination, on discrimination against women or against men, rewriting it to add sexual orientation or gender identity."
Within the span of a single week the Supreme Court of the United States:
- Rewrote a statute that had been figuratively written in stone for 56 years to provide rights never intended
- Ruled it was permissible for a state to require a showing of need in order to exercise a constitutional right
- Ruled that a president cannot end by executive action a program established by an earlier president’s executive action
Cruz was right when he said that the court’s decisions were "lawless" and "gamesmanship" and "contrary to the judicial oath that each of the nine justices has taken."
Severino was correct when she observed the chief justice has allowed the high court to be "weaponized for partisan ends."
And finally Thomas was spot on when he said, "the Court simply looks the other way" as the constitutional rights of Americans are being stripped.
Lady Justice is supposed to be blind. But now she’s peeking beneath her blindfold to see who’s petitioning the court.
When the high court acts contrary to the Constitution to achieve a political end, the people lose faith in the judicial system.
Instead of "equal justice under the law," it becomes another partisan tool typically found in any banana republic.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and has been a frequent contributor to BizPac Review and Liberty Unyielding. He is also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and an enthusiastic Second Amendment supporter, who can often be found honing his skills at the range. Read Michael Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here.
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