{"id":111979,"date":"2025-03-26T11:03:01","date_gmt":"2025-03-26T19:03:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/03\/26\/republicans-want-to-eliminate-federal-courts-because-theyre-checking-and-balancing-donald-trump\/"},"modified":"2025-03-26T11:03:01","modified_gmt":"2025-03-26T19:03:01","slug":"republicans-want-to-eliminate-federal-courts-because-theyre-checking-and-balancing-donald-trump","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/03\/26\/republicans-want-to-eliminate-federal-courts-because-theyre-checking-and-balancing-donald-trump\/","title":{"rendered":"Republicans Want To Eliminate Federal Courts Because They\u2019re Checking And Balancing Donald Trump"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
(Photo by SAUL LOEB\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For a party that\u2019s been absolutely obsessed <\/a>with ruminating about every farting thing the founding fathers ever thought, Republicans in 2025 have spent an awful lot of time trying to destroy the system of government those same founding fathers created. Because foundational to the American system of government is the notion of three co-equal branches of government, and an intricate system of checks and balances to prevent any branch from making a power-play. <\/p>\n

But when federal judges \u2014 ones appointed by Democrats and Republicans<\/a> alike \u2014 have presented speed bumps to Donald Trump\u2018s authoritarian takeover, the GOP responded with name-calling <\/a>and articles of impeachment<\/a>. The latest option Republicans are considering in response to the impediment of federal judges is much more extreme. <\/p>\n

Yesterday, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson proposed<\/a> eliminating federal courts because they\u2019ve issued decisions that are in opposition to President Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do have the authority over the federal courts, as you know. We can eliminate an entire district court. We have power of funding over the courts and all these other things,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cBut desperate times call for desperate measures, and Congress is going to act.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jim Jordan spoke vaguely about \u201clegislative remedies\u201d to the problem of district courts acting entirely appropriately, mind you. He said, \u201cWe got money, spending, the appropriations process to help try to address some of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oh, my god \u2014 is Sen. Josh Hawley being the reasonable one? He complained that eliminating a district court would create \u201cmassive, massive backlogs.\u201d He continued, \u201cMy view is, I\u2019d like to get more Republican judges on the bench. If we take away seats, we can\u2019t do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mercifully, the plan is still in the mere posturing phase. But I shudder to imagine the absolutely apoplectic reaction we would have seen from these exact folks if Nancy Pelosi had even floated the idea in 2009.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her<\/a> with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Mastodon @Kathryn1@mastodon.social.<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Republicans Want To Eliminate Federal Courts Because They\u2019re Checking And Balancing Donald Trump<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"
(Photo by SAUL LOEB\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For a party that\u2019s been absolutely obsessed <\/a>with ruminating about every farting thing the founding fathers ever thought, Republicans in 2025 have spent an awful lot of time trying to destroy the system of government those same founding fathers created. Because foundational to the American system of government is the notion of three co-equal branches of government, and an intricate system of checks and balances to prevent any branch from making a power-play. <\/p>\n

But when federal judges \u2014 ones appointed by Democrats and Republicans<\/a> alike \u2014 have presented speed bumps to Donald Trump\u2018s authoritarian takeover, the GOP responded with name-calling <\/a>and articles of impeachment<\/a>. The latest option Republicans are considering in response to the impediment of federal judges is much more extreme. <\/p>\n

Yesterday, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson proposed<\/a> eliminating federal courts because they\u2019ve issued decisions that are in opposition to President Trump.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do have the authority over the federal courts, as you know. We can eliminate an entire district court. We have power of funding over the courts and all these other things,\u201d Johnson said. \u201cBut desperate times call for desperate measures, and Congress is going to act.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jim Jordan spoke vaguely about \u201clegislative remedies\u201d to the problem of district courts acting entirely appropriately, mind you. He said, \u201cWe got money, spending, the appropriations process to help try to address some of this.\u201d<\/p>\n

Oh, my god \u2014 is Sen. Josh Hawley being the reasonable one? He complained that eliminating a district court would create \u201cmassive, massive backlogs.\u201d He continued, \u201cMy view is, I\u2019d like to get more Republican judges on the bench. If we take away seats, we can\u2019t do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mercifully, the plan is still in the mere posturing phase. But I shudder to imagine the absolutely apoplectic reaction we would have seen from these exact folks if Nancy Pelosi had even floated the idea in 2009.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her<\/a> with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Mastodon @[email\u00a0protected].<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(Photo by SAUL LOEB\/AFP via Getty Images) For a party that\u2019s been absolutely obsessed with ruminating about every farting thing the founding fathers ever thought, Republicans in 2025 have spent an awful lot of time trying to destroy the system of government those same founding fathers created. Because foundational to the American system of government […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":111938,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-111979","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-above_the_law"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/xira.com\/p\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/IMG_5243-1-scaled-e1623338814705-620x568-22aeRn.jpeg?fit=620%2C568&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111979","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111979"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111979\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111979"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111979"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}