{"id":140231,"date":"2025-12-29T12:54:05","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T20:54:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/12\/29\/best-of-25-watch-the-exact-moment-john-roberts-realizes-he-whored-himself-out\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T12:54:05","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T20:54:05","slug":"best-of-25-watch-the-exact-moment-john-roberts-realizes-he-whored-himself-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2025\/12\/29\/best-of-25-watch-the-exact-moment-john-roberts-realizes-he-whored-himself-out\/","title":{"rendered":"Best Of \u201925: Watch The Exact Moment John Roberts Realizes He Whored Himself Out"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/03\/watch-the-exact-moment-john-roberts-realizes-he-whored-himself-out\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Best Of \u201925: Watch The Exact Moment John Roberts Realizes He Whored Himself Out<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignright is-resized\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" height=\"413\" width=\"620\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2024\/09\/GettyImages-1198673035-620x413.jpg?resize=620%2C413&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">(Photo by Leah Millis-Pool\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>They thought prostituting themselves wouldn\u2019t mean losing control, but after accidentally falling in love they tragically learn they were just thought of as a whore by tacky oligarchs. No, it\u2019s not the plot of Best Picture winner <em>Anora<\/em> \u2014 I mean, it is that too \u2014 but the very real human drama of Chief Justice John Roberts.<\/p>\n<p>Roberts showed up at the State of the Union last night expecting to take in another evening of sitting stonefaced while pretending it\u2019s not weird that the judicial branch attends the president\u2019s annual report to Congress. <\/p>\n<p>Instead, he had the emperor\u2019s robes ripped off him by a bumbling chief executive who doesn\u2019t understand the conservative judicial pantomime:<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-embed wp-block-embed-embed\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"bluesky-embed\" data-bluesky-uri=\"at:\/\/did:plc:t4x2ruk2qmob2b2cx55h4v7r\/app.bsky.feed.post\/3ljma42ek5227\" data-bluesky-cid=\"bafyreicpu2pzjtdjjj6rjpzqsa2b2lhooxme3seutrbtfbyogkfzmylyme\">\n<p lang=\"en\">\u201cThank you again. Thank you again. Won\u2019t forget it,\u201d Trump says while shaking the hand of Supreme Court Justice John Roberts after the State of the Union.<\/p>\n<div>\u2014 <\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/did:plc:t4x2ruk2qmob2b2cx55h4v7r?ref_src=embed\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Anna Bower (@annabower.bsky.social)<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/did:plc:t4x2ruk2qmob2b2cx55h4v7r\/post\/3ljma42ek5227?ref_src=embed\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">2025-03-05T05:18:11.964Z<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>The first rule of Federalist Society Partisan Club is <em>you do not talk about Federalist Society Partisan Club<\/em>! The second rule is <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/02\/dear-federalist-society-its-time-to-lay-off-the-chick-fil-a\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">enjoy the Chick-fil-A<\/a>. Except for Sam \u201cFlagman\u201d Alito, the conservative justices work hard to peddle the mythology that they aren\u2019t die-hard Republicans reverse engineering contemporary GOP policy but conscientious jurists calling balls and strikes. They\u2019ll make up reasons <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2024\/07\/exposing-the-originalism-lie\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">why Alexander Hamilton would\u2019ve wanted them<\/a> to give police total immunity or plead that <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2022\/04\/read-the-opinion-urges-supreme-court-justice-constantly-ruling-without-written-opinions\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">you have to read their opinions<\/a> and then not issue any opinions in increasingly consequential shadow docket cases \u2014 but they want you to know that they are always ALWAYS non-partisan.<\/p>\n<p>In <em>Trump v. United States<\/em> \u2014 ending Trump\u2019s federal criminal cases and inventing a new double-whammy to shield presidents from state cases \u2014 the Chief took great pains to characterize the ruling as entirely normal. Even though the argument in the case explicitly contemplated \u201cusing SEAL Team 6 to assassinate a political rival.\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2024\/07\/trump-immunity-opinion-textualist-originalist\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">The opinion is laughably shoddy<\/a>, but it plays <em>the game<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Roberts and his buddies wanted Trump to win and they thought the electorate might balk if they found out some Russian agent lived in Trump\u2019s pool locker stealing nuclear codes for four years or whatever lives in the Jack Smith report that Aileen Cannon and Pam Bondi do NOT want us to see. So he cobbled together this opinion to give his favored candidate a hand. Then he wrote an annual report <a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/01\/john-roberts-annual-report-2024\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">scolding anyone who might scrutinize judicial opinions enough to suggest a judge might be a partisan hack<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Maybe Roberts believes his own mythology. It would be insane, but it\u2019s possible. But whether his illusion was shattered or just his attempt to cover it up, Trump busted through it all when he said what everyone else already knew while patting the Chief on the chest. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThank you again,\u201d he said, implying this is not the first time he\u2019s thanked him. \u201cWon\u2019t forget it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As anyone who\u2019s followed Trump\u2019s career knows\u2026 he will absolutely forget it. Roberts might be coming to grips with all that right now.<\/p>\n<p><strong>See Also: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/2025\/03\/the-amy-coney-barrett-clip-that-will-have-scotus-followers-talking\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Amy Coney Barrett Clip That Will Have SCOTUS Followers Talking<\/a><\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong><em><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright  wp-image-443318\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/abovethelaw.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/11\/Headshot-300x200.jpg?resize=188%2C125&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"Headshot\" width=\"188\" height=\"125\" title=\"\"><a href=\"http:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/author\/joe-patrice\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Joe Patrice<\/a>\u00a0is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of <a href=\"http:\/\/legaltalknetwork.com\/podcasts\/thinking-like-a-lawyer\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. Feel free to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/abovethelaw.com\/cdn-cgi\/l\/email-protection#0f65606a7f6e7b7d666c6a4f6e6d60796a7b676a636e78216c6062\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">email<\/a> any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/josephpatrice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Twitter<\/a>\u00a0or <a href=\"https:\/\/bsky.app\/profile\/joepatrice.bsky.social\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Bluesky<\/a> if you\u2019re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rpnexecsearch.com\/josephpatrice\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Managing Director at RPN Executive Search<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The post Best Of \u201925: Watch The Exact Moment John Roberts Realizes He Whored Himself Out appeared first on Above the Law. (Photo by Leah Millis-Pool\/Getty Images) They thought prostituting themselves wouldn\u2019t mean losing control, but after accidentally falling in love they tragically learn they were just thought of as a whore by tacky oligarchs. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":140232,"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-140231","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\/12\/GettyImages-1198673035-scaled-p1v1Si.jpg?fit=2560%2C1707&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140231","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=140231"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140231\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140232"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140231"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140231"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140231"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}