The Patriot Post® · Joe Biden Moves to Pack the Supreme Court

By Douglas Andrews ·
https://patriotpost.us/articles/79070-joe-biden-moves-to-pack-the-supreme-court-2021-04-12

President Joe Biden, who with each passing week finds new ways to disgrace himself and the office to which he’s been entrusted, is at it once again. Having seen his party fail to sufficiently affect the composition of the U.S. Supreme Court within our constitutionally agreed-upon framework, Biden on Friday signed an executive order establishing his Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court, which is tasked with, among other things, considering the “membership and size of the Court.” In other words, packing the High Court.

When we were kids on the playground, we had a word for this: cheating. Think about it: Any neighborhood kid who tried to change the rules of the game in order to gain an advantage was quickly and roundly set upon. We were just kids, but even back then we understood the difference between right and wrong. Joe Biden doesn’t. Or, if he does, he simply doesn’t care. And, come to think of it, this backslapper has been lying and cheating about little things and big things his whole life, so why are we at all surprised?

Regarding his plan, The Wall Street Journal reports, “Biden ordered a commission to study Supreme Court changes such as adding seats, an idea pushed by progressives in his party that faces strong opposition from congressional Republicans. Mr. Biden said during his campaign that he would create a bipartisan commission to study expanding the court or creating term limits for justices. … The 36-member commission will be charged with completing its findings within 180 days of its first public meeting and will preside over a fraught political moment for the future of the nation’s high court.”

Biden is more than just a liar and a cheat; he’s also a coward, utterly unwilling to tell the unhinged far-left flank of his party to pound sand. Despite his campaign waffling, this was the perfect opportunity to do just that, the perfect opportunity to pay just a modicum of lip service to his Inauguration Day promise. “I pledge this to you,” Biden said on January 20, “I will be a president for all Americans. All Americans. And I promise you: I will fight as hard for those who did not support me as for those who did.”

Alas, it wasn’t to be. As the far-left New York Times reports, “The president acted under pressure from activists pushing for more seats to alter the ideological balance of the court after President Donald J. Trump appointed three justices, including one to a seat that Republicans had blocked his predecessor, Barack Obama, from filling for almost a year.”

The makeup of this 36-member “bipartisan” commission certainly won’t be 18-18, and it’s leadership is, naturally, leftist. Even if it were balanced, no self-respecting Republican or conservative should agree to be on that commission, though a few have. Agreeing to do so lends an air of legitimacy to it. But there’s not a whiff of legitimacy to be found anywhere on a commission whose purpose is likely to make the case for packing the Supreme Court — or at the very least intimidating justices and judges to bow to progressive demands.

In fact, leftist Justice Stephen Breyer acknowledged the problem. “Those whose initial instincts may favor important structural change or other similar institutional changes, such as forms of court-packing, [should] think long and hard before they embody those changes in law,” he said last week. There’s currently “a trust that the Court is guided by legal principle, not politics,” but, he warned, “structural alteration motivated by the perception of political influence can only feed that latter perception, further eroding that trust.”

If President Unity asks, we should tell him what he failed to tell the hard leftists who put him up to this: Pound sand, Joe. Pound sand.