Donald Trump continued his temper tantrum against the Supreme Court’s tariff decision, taking an opportunity last night to specifically call out two of his appointees for joining the majority. “Two of the people that voted for that, I appointed,” Trump slurred during his speech to the National Republican Congressional Committee dinner, “And they sicken me… They sicken me because they’re bad for our country.”
As a reminder, this is the second time for Amy Coney Barrett, who literally sickened Trump when her nomination party turned into a COVID superspreader event that sent Trump to the hospital.
It’s true that tariffs had provided the government billions in revenue, because that’s how massive tax increases work. What Trump never seemed to figure out is that those costs aren’t paid by other countries, but by importers who then pass it on down the chain to the consumer in higher prices. Tariffs can punish other countries for their trade practices if the price increase on imported goods causes consumers to shift to domestic products, but since the administration didn’t realize America can’t grow bananas for almost a year, it’s safe to say these rocket scientists weren’t carefully crafting a strategy to protect homegrown products.
For Gorsuch and Barrett (to a slightly lesser extent since she did not join the most expansive part of the Trump immunity opinion), they join Chief Justice Roberts in learning that, no matter how much you debase yourself to rewrite the rule of law to help this guy, it’s never enough. These justices went full Nicholas Cage to find language in some hidden version of the Constitution to totally immunize a president for stealing classified documents — apparently for the purpose of helping your private business interests — and having your lawyer lie to the government about that fact, participating in a scheme to defraud voters, and even assassinate political rivals. But they were still one decision away from him deciding that they “sicken” him.
And, hey, the Supreme Court sickens me too. The difference is Above the Law readers are highly intelligent, beautiful people, and Trump’s audience are the people who tried to hang Mike Pence and then received pardons for it. The phrase hits a little different for those folks. It’s the “will no one rid me of these troublesome judges?” drumbeat his administration has lobbed at lower court judges for months, finally leveled up to the Supreme Court.
But they have no one to blame but themselves.
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter or Bluesky if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.
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