Tag: scotus

Climate Activist Dies After Lighting Himself Ablaze On Supreme Court Steps

A Colorado man has died 24 hours after lighting himself on fire in front of the United States Supreme Court on Earth Day as part of what appears to be a religious protest against the use of fossil fuels and in order to bring attention to climate change.

On Friday evening, Washington, D.C., first responders airlifted Wynn Bruce, a 50-year-old climate activist, to a local hospital after he engulfed himself in flames. He later died Saturday evening despite medical efforts to save his life.

Those reportedly close to Bruce are emphasizing that he did not consider this to be an act of suicide, rather that he was simply practicing Shambhala Buddhism and viewed the intentional act as one of self-immolation in order to draw attention to the supposedly damaging effects of climate change.

On Twitter, Zen Buddhist priest and environmental scientist Dr. K Kritee tweeted, “This guy was my friend. He meditated with our sangha. This act is not suicide. This is a deeply fearless act of compassion to bring attention to climate crisis.”

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Justice Sotomayor: People Who Know FBI Crime Stats Must Be Banned From Capital Case Juries

Supreme Court justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissent on Monday arguing that anyone who is familiar with FBI crime stats must be banned from Capital case juries for “racial bias.”

She was backed in her dissent by Justice Kagan and retiring Justice Breyer.

Steve Sailor posted highlights from Sotomayor’s dissent as shared by the Supreme Court:

Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022) 1
SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
KRISTOPHER LOVE v. TEXAS
ON PETITION FOR WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS OF TEXAS
No. 21–5050. Decided April 18, 2022
The petition for a writ of certiorari is denied.

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with whom JUSTICE BREYER and
JUSTICE KAGAN join, dissenting from the denial of summary vacatur.

[…] The seating of a racially biased juror, therefore, can never be harmless. As with other forms of disqualifying bias, if even one racially biased juror is empaneled and the death penalty is imposed, “the State is disentitled to execute the sentence,” Morgan v. Illinois, 504 U. S. 719, 729 (1992).

In this case, petitioner Kristopher Love, a Black man, claims that one of the jurors in his capital trial was racially biased because the juror asserted during jury selection that “[n]on-white” races were statistically more violent than the white race. […]

“You’ll notice that Justice Sotomayor capitalizes ‘black’ but uses lower case for ‘white,’ which proves she’s not racially biased,” Sailor commented.

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Ketanji Brown Jackson chose leniency even in baby sex torture cases

In the eight child-porn cases that came before her court, former D.C. District Court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson heard horrifying details of “sadomasochistic” torture of young kids — including “infants and toddlers” — yet challenged the disturbing evidence presented by prosecutors and disregarded their prison recommendations to give the lightest possible punishments in each case, according to transcripts of sentencing hearings obtained by the Post.

In some cases, she even apologized to some of the kiddie-porn perverts for having to follow the statutes, which she called “substantially flawed.”

Over and over, the records reveal, Jackson made excuses for the sex fiends’ criminal behavior and cut them slack in defiance of investigators and prosecutors — and sometimes even probation officers serving her court — who argued for tougher sentences because the cases were particularly egregious or the defendants weren’t remorseful.

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Republicans Accuse Biden White House of a ‘Cover-Up’ as New Details on SCOTUS Nominee Come to Light

Senate Republicans are claiming the Biden White House withheld information that bolsters the GOP position that Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson is far too lenient in child pornography cases.

“When we first highlighted her record on child porn cases, the White House leaked information to their friends in the media and Democrats on the Judiciary Committee,” Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri said, according to Fox News.

“They hid it from the public despite knowing Judge Jackson gives lenient sentences to criminals. The White House is still refusing to be transparent about Judge Jackson’s record,” he said.

Jackson was the judge in the case of U.S. v. Cane, which involved “over 6,500 files depicting children appearing to be of elementary, middle and high school ages, engaged in sexual acts or posing sexually,” Fox News reported.

Jackson in that case sentenced Cane to 60 months in prison, below the 84 months recommended by the probation office. Republicans claim it was left off of a list of cases given to them on purpose; the White House has said there was no intent to hide the case and that the case proves Jackson was not soft on child pornography defendants.

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ABC Anchor: Questioning Judge Jackson About Light Sentences For Child Porn Offenders Was “A Message To QAnon”

Yet another media talking head has claimed that Republicans probing into Biden Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s history of light sentences for child porn offenders is some kind of “message to QAnon.” 

As we noted last week, several lawmakers grilled Jackson over the issue, prompting her to state that the cases she has presided over are “difficult” and that judges have to look at “various aspects of the offence and impose a sentence that is sufficient but not greater than necessary”.

Discussing the matter Sunday, ABC Jon Karl suggested that GOP lawmakers were sending some kind of message to right wing conspiracy theorists by continuing the line of questioning.

Karl suggested that the questions in the Senate were “harsh and highly unusual” and wondered “could the sharp questioning backfire” on Republicans with midterm elections approaching.

Karl then asked former Democratic National Committee chairwoman Donna Brazile about the “focus on child pornography and pedophiles,” To which she simply replied “QAnon.”

Karl responded “it was a message to QAnon, wasn’t it?” further suggesting “these are not major cases, these were sentencing decisions.” 

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Rabid Democrats Call on Justice Thomas to Recuse Himself From Jan. 6 Cases Because His Wife Exercised Her First Amendment Rights on 2020 Election

Rabid Democrats are now calling on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from any cases related to January 6 because his wife Virginia “Ginni” Thomas exercised her First Amendment rights to friends in private texts regarding the 2020 election.

Recall, the January 6 Committee on Thursday leaked Ginni Thomas’ text exchanges with Mark Meadows to the Washington Post as her husband was hospitalized with an infection.

The text messages exchanged between Ginni Thomas and Trump’s former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows are uneventful.

The media however is having a feeding frenzy over Ginni Thomas’ benign text messages that are completely covered by the First Amendment.

Many Democrat lawmakers are now calling on Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from January 6 cases because his wife sent text messages to Mark Meadows encouraging him to fight for Trump and expose the election fraud.

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How the Supreme Court Rewrote the Constitution Part VII: Concentration Camps and the End

This is the last installment in a series on the nadir, or low point, of the U.S. Supreme Court. This was the period from 1937 to 1944, when the court stopped protecting the Constitution’s limits on the federal government. Our Constitution has never fully recovered.

The first, second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth installments related to how the justices initially tried to balance the demands of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal with the Constitution’s rules. In 1937, however, Roosevelt began to replace sitting justices with New Deal enthusiasts who had no prior judicial credentials. The remodeled bench successively discarded limits on federal spending, federal property ownership, and federal economic regulation. In at least one case, it abandoned habeas corpus and the right to a trial by jury.

This final installment addresses the court’s role in what was, aside from slavery, the most egregious violation of civil rights in U.S. history. It adds some observations on how the court’s abysmal record from 1937 to 1944 continues to affect us today.

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