SCOTUS conservatives issue scathing rebuke of Justice Jackson in injunctions ruling

The Supreme Court’s Friday ruling narrowing the scope of judicial injunctions also included a scathing rebuke of Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, asserting she sought an “imperial judiciary” and that her views ran afoul of more than 200 years of precedent.

“We will not dwell on JUSTICE JACKSON’s argument, which is at odds with more than two centuries’ worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself. We observe only this: JUSTICE JACKSON decries an imperial Executive while embracing an imperial Judiciary,” wrote Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

“JUSTICE JACKSON would do well to heed her own admonition: “[E]veryone, from the President on down, is bound by
law.” Ibid. That goes for judges too,” she added.

Barrett further criticized Jackson for ignoring relevant statutes because they contained “boring ‘legalese.'”

The justices found that Congress had not given lower court judges the authority to impose nationwide injunctions and that they were unnecessary for the courts to provide relief to plaintiff parties.

While the ruling was a clear win for the Trump administration, Barrett’s choice words for Jackson appeared to signal a growing frustration between conservative justices and their newest colleague.

“Rhetoric aside, JUSTICE JACKSON’s position is difficult to pin down. She might be arguing that universal injunctions are appropriate—even required—whenever the defendant is part of the Executive Branch,” Barrett wrote. “If so, her position goes far beyond the mainstream defense of universal injunctions.”

“As best we can tell, though, her argument is more extreme still, because its logic does not depend on the entry of a universal injunction: JUSTICE JACKSON appears to believe that the reasoning behind any court order demands “universal adherence,” at least where the Executive is concerned,” Barrett went on.