President Biden railed against “extreme opinions” at the Supreme Court as he announced major court reform proposals during a Monday speech at the LBJ Presidential Library.
“I have great respect for our institutions, the separation of powers laid out in our Constitution,” Biden said. “What’s happening now is not consistent with that doctrine of separation of powers. Extremism is undermining the public confidence in the court’s decisions.”
Biden used his remarks to warn in stark terms the dangers of an “extreme” and polarized court, arguing it would undo civil rights protections and grant excessive powers to future presidents.
He cited a slew of recent Supreme Court opinions that he said “have undermined long established civil rights principles and protections.” He pointed to the 2013 Shelby County case that gutted aspects of the Voting Rights Act; the 2022 ruling that overturned Roe v. Wade; the 2023 ruling that ended affirmative action; and this year’s ruling that granted wide immunity to presidents for official acts taken while in office.
“This nation was founded on the principle there are no kings in America,” Biden said. “Each of us legally follows the law. No one is above the law. For all practical purposes, the court’s decision almost certainly means that a president can violate their oath, flout our laws and face no consequences.”
The speech came hours after Biden announced in an op-ed a three-part proposal to reform the Supreme Court. The president called for term limits for justices, a binding code of ethics and a constitutional amendment to counteract the justices’ recent presidential immunity decision. It marked a major shift for the president, who had long resisted calls from the left for reform.
Biden’s speech on Monday also served to mark the 60th anniversary of former President Johnson signing into law the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The event was attended by Johnson’s daughter, Lynda Robb, and many Democratic lawmakers, including Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.), Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) and Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.).
During his remarks, Biden delivered some of his most direct condemnations to date of the court’s ethics controversies, describing “obvious conflicts of interest.” The recent scandals include reports of conservative Justice Clarence Thomas accepting luxury trips and gifts from a billionaire and Republican mega-donor, though the controversies have implicated justices in both ideological camps.
Biden said the court is “not self-policing” as he attacked the court’s ethics code that it released in November with no enforcement mechanism.
“The Supreme Court’s current ethics code is weak, and even more frightening, voluntary,” he said.
He also argued for 18-year term limits for justices. Such limits would make appointments more predictable, Biden said, and would prevent a single president from drastically reshaping the court, a thinly veiled nod to former President Trump’s appointment of three conservative justices during his four years in office.
“That would help ensure the country would not have what it has now: an extreme court that’s the product of an attack on the confirmation process that’s weaponized by those seeking to carry out an extreme agenda for decades to come,” Biden said.
The push is widely viewed as something of a big swing to cement Biden’s legacy after he announced earlier this month he would not seek reelection. Vice President Harris on Monday said she supported the president’s proposal, and, like Biden, the vice president does not support expanding the court, a spokesperson for her campaign told The Hill.
White House officials acknowledged his reform proposals face long odds to becoming reality as they would require congressional action, but suggested public support for Supreme Court reform would help create pressure on Congress to act.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) earlier Monday called Biden’s proposal “dead on arrival.”
“His thinking is dead on arrival,” Biden said in his remarks on Monday.