John Roberts reveals he isn't 'any safer' from Trump 'than the rest of us': analysis

22 March

John Roberts

In a rare move, U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Roberts gave President Donald Trump a stern rebuke in response to his incendiary attacks on District Judge James Boasberg — the Barack Obama appointee who temporarily halted deportations of Venezuelan nationals allegedly associated with the violent Tren de Aragua gang. Trump is calling for the impeachment of Boasberg and other federal judges who are blocking, at least for the time being, his executive orders.

Roberts, in his rebuke, emphasized that impeaching judges because one is unhappy with a particular ruling is bad policy. And many Trump critics, both left and right, are pointing out that a federal judge like Boasberg is supposed to play an important role in the United States' system of checks and balances.

In a rambling post on his Truth Social platform, Trump wrote, "This Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator who was sadly appointed by Barack Hussein Obama, was not elected President - He didn’t WIN the popular VOTE (by a lot!), he didn’t WIN ALL SEVEN SWING STATES, he didn’t WIN 2,750 to 525 Counties, HE DIDN’T WIN ANYTHING! I WON FOR MANY REASONS, IN AN OVERWHELMING MANDATE, BUT FIGHTING ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION MAY HAVE BEEN THE NUMBER ONE REASON FOR THIS HISTORIC VICTORY. I’m just doing what the VOTERS wanted me to do. This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED!!! WE DON’T WANT VICIOUS, VIOLENT, AND DEMENTED CRIMINALS, MANY OF THEM DERANGED MURDERERS, IN OUR COUNTRY. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!"

That is exactly the type of rhetoric that Roberts has a problem with. But Salon's Heather Digby Parton, in an article published on March 18, emphasizes that Roberts himself bears some of the blame for Trump's vitriolic attacks on federal judges.

Parton writes, "Trump's 'ref-working' against every judge who doesn't rule his way is becoming a big problem for the Supreme Court, and Chief Justice John Roberts knows it. Whether he and his colleagues will have the fortitude to stand up to him and preserve the Constitution and American democracy when the time comes is a bet I wouldn't want to make after what they did with the January 6 case. Their credibility is already fragile."

Roberts was part of the 6-3 majority in the U.S. Supreme Court's controversial Trump v. the United States ruling, handed down on July 1, 2024. All six of the High Court's GOP-appointed justices, including Roberts, ruled that U.S. presidents enjoy absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for "official acts" taken in office but not for "unofficial" acts.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in her scathing dissent, argued the ruling gave presidents way too much power — and that a president could order the assassination of a political rival and claim it was an official act.

Parton argues that even the High Court's conservative justices are not immune to the potential abuses encouraged by their own ruling.

"But maybe Trump's antics have broken through a little bit to show that no matter how grateful he is for the get-out-of-jail-free card, they're not any safer from the chainsaw than the rest of us," the Salon journalist writes.

Heather Digby Parton's full article for Salon is available at this link.

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