Steve Vladeck:
It’s really quite remarkable. And it’s remarkable both that the chief justice chose to weigh in and how quickly he did.
President Trump just, I think, first publicly called for the impeachment of Chief Judge Boasberg on Monday. And, by Tuesday, you have Chief John Roberts, who does nothing without deliberation, issuing this statement.
I think it’s a striking concession by the chief justice that these are not ordinary times. And, frankly, I think it’s a message not to President Trump, but rather to every district judge in the country that the chief justice has their back, and to us, the American people, that whatever you think of the courts, whatever you think of the Supreme Court today, our system is predicated on the idea that the courts get to interpret the law, and that, if they get it wrong, the right remedy is to appeal.
And if the Supreme Court gets it wrong, that’s when we talk about what Congress can do. Can we amend the Constitution? The right remedy is not for an individual president to be able to say, I don’t agree with this decision, so I’m not going to follow it. Otherwise, then you have a government not of laws. You have a government of one person, and that’s exactly what the Constitution set up to avoid.
