Federal law is clear – protests at or near homes of Supreme Court Justices are illegal, punishable by a year in prison. Why? To protect justices and prevent intimidation. Biden’s pro-abortion Attorney General Merrick Garland refuses to enforce the law – even after a protestor tried to kill a justice. The time has come to fish or cut bait – He must either enforce the law or resign.
18 USC 1507 is not ambiguous. It reads: “Whoever, with the intent of … influencing any judge … in the discharge of his duty, pickets … in or near a building housing a court of the United States, or in or near a building or residence occupied or used by such judge … or near any such building or residence, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both.”
Supporting cases are clear. In Grace, et al, v. Burger (1981), the DC Circuit held: “We emphasize that expressive conduct designed to disrupt the Supreme Court or to in any way influence the administration of justice is not protected by our opinion today,” adding “Such conduct is properly prohibited by 18 U.S.C. § 1507.”
Can the law be any clearer? We do not want judges and justices intimidated, threatened, placed in fear for their lives or the lives of their children – full stop. We do not tolerate that behavior in a nation premised on rulings by an independent judiciary.
AG Garland is not ignorant, he is willful – and willfully choosing not to enforce this critical federal law. He sat on the DC circuit in the decade after that ruling. He knows the law.
Not only have we seen extreme protests at the homes of five Supreme Court Justices – whose names are on an illegally leaked draft opinion reversing Roe v. Wade, but these justices have been personally threatened, as have their children. This is a clear attempt at intimidation.
Justice Kavanaugh escaped death by swift action of two US Marshalls. This fact alone changes the lives of justices, their families, and the notion of respect for a judiciary independent of politics – forever.
If he had been killed, or if any justice is harmed, we face a national crisis of untold proportions – the unprecedented killing of a sitting justice, presumably a conservative, who would then be replaced by a Democrat president and congress, would thoroughly undermine civic respect, civil order, and would likely lead to mass violence across the country. History teaches, we must learn.
That Biden did nothing – and continues to do nothing – to discourage such violence, just as he did nothing during violent 2020 race riots, is a disgrace. That a Democrat Majority Leader, Chuck Schumer, threatened justices reversing Roe “would pay” is abhorrent, utterly irresponsible That Speaker Pelosi has gone so far as to encourage violence, pushing “righteous anger,” is an abomination.
But the abdication of responsibility that warrants reversal, impeachment, or resignation is by AG Garland. This AG was ten when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated, lived through killings of former AG and candidate Robert Kennedy, civil rights leader Martin Luther King.
If any generation – any person – should understand the horrifying and destabilizing effects of political violence against any leader, president, candidate, former AG, civil rights leader – or Supreme Court justice – with nerves raw, Democrats in charge – it is AG Garland.
To be blunt, there is no excuse – absolutely none – for not enforcing laws written to protect the Supreme Court, sitting Justices, their families, and Republic itself. Not to do so is more than bad judgment, more than e triumph of dirty politics over our independent judiciary, more than wrongheaded, narrow-minded, or simply irresponsible.
Not to pull all stops, get the president, vice president, all congressional leaders, cabinet members, and national voices to plead for no violence – is to invite it. Not to prosecute those in clear violation of federal law intended to protect our judiciary, is to be complicit in potential violence.
The time is now to step up, to arrest and prosecute ALL those violating federal law, seeking to intimidate, threaten, and otherwise impair the independence of our federal judiciary. Ironically, AG Garland is a former judge himself – who knows that this is essential to protect the nation.
Putting a fine point on this abdication of responsibility and defiance of his sworn duty, the present moment must trigger one of three actions – either a swift reversal by AG Garland resulting in prosecutions that deter future violence, his resignation, or impeachment.
Given that AG Garland seems unwilling to enforce federal law, thus puts justices in fear and at risk; given that Democrats in House and Senate are not going to impeach him but cheer his abdication of constitutional responsibility – reality is this. If AG Garland will not enforce laws to prevent and deter violence, protect the High Court and justices, he should resign.