{"id":157831,"date":"2026-07-22T15:35:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T23:35:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/07\/22\/senate-democrats-reintroduce-supreme-court-term-limits-bill-and-the-polling-has-never-been-friendlier\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T15:35:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T23:35:09","slug":"senate-democrats-reintroduce-supreme-court-term-limits-bill-and-the-polling-has-never-been-friendlier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/2026\/07\/22\/senate-democrats-reintroduce-supreme-court-term-limits-bill-and-the-polling-has-never-been-friendlier\/","title":{"rendered":"Senate Democrats Reintroduce Supreme Court Term Limits Bill, And The Polling Has Never Been Friendlier"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sheldon Whitehouse is back with the BATL Act<\/a>, and this time, the public is standing behind him.<\/p>\n

Whitehouse, along with Senators Cory Booker, Richard Blumenthal, and Alex Padilla, reintroduced the Supreme Court Biennial Appointments and Term Limits Act today. Same structure as the last two goes: 18-year terms, with the president required to appoint a justice in the first and third years of each presidential term. Only the nine most recently appointed justices hear cases arising under the Court\u2019s appellate jurisdiction, which is to say essentially everything anyone has ever heard of. Everyone else keeps the seat, the salary, and the original jurisdiction docket. That\u2019s the move that makes this a bill instead of a Constitutional amendment, and my colleague Joe Patrice has walked through why it works<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And man, is the proposal popular.<\/p>\n

The senator\u2019s office cites two-thirds support for term limits. PRRI had it at three-quarters last fall, including 67% of Republicans.<\/a> Joe\u2019s numbers from May had it north of 70 percent.<\/a> The range varies by pollster; the direction does not. When we looked at this a few weeks ago<\/a>, 65% of Americans backed 18-year terms \u2014 including 61% of independents and 56% of Republicans \u2014 against the backdrop of confidence in the Court hitting a record low<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The cosponsor list is Hirono, Merkley, Welch, Schatz, Gillibrand, Schiff, and Murray. All Democrats, which remains the entire problem. The United States is one of five countries<\/a> on earth with life tenure for its highest court, and 49 of 50 states limit their own top judges through terms, elections, or mandatory retirement ages. <\/p>\n

Listen, this bill isn\u2019t going anywhere fast. But\u2026 man, that polling keeps moving in one direction, the Court keeps supplying the reasons, and eventually the arithmetic of a proposal that a majority of Republican voters support is going to get awkward for the GOP leadership.<\/p>\n

Earlier:<\/strong> Supreme Court Term Limits Are The Least Dangerous, Most Necessary Reform On The Menu<\/a> <\/p>\n

New Poll Shows Americans \u2014 Even Republicans \u2014 Think The Supreme Court Needs To Be Reined In<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of\u00a0The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of\u00a0Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email\u00a0her<\/a>\u00a0with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter\u00a0@Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky\u00a0@Kathryn1<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The post Senate Democrats Reintroduce Supreme Court Term Limits Bill, And The Polling Has Never Been Friendlier<\/a> appeared first on Above the Law<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t(Photo by Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States via Getty Images)\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sheldon Whitehouse is back with the BATL Act<\/a>, and this time, the public is standing behind him.<\/p>\n

Whitehouse, along with Senators Cory Booker, Richard Blumenthal, and Alex Padilla, reintroduced the Supreme Court Biennial Appointments and Term Limits Act today. Same structure as the last two goes: 18-year terms, with the president required to appoint a justice in the first and third years of each presidential term. Only the nine most recently appointed justices hear cases arising under the Court\u2019s appellate jurisdiction, which is to say essentially everything anyone has ever heard of. Everyone else keeps the seat, the salary, and the original jurisdiction docket. That\u2019s the move that makes this a bill instead of a Constitutional amendment, and my colleague Joe Patrice has walked through why it works<\/a>.<\/p>\n

And man, is the proposal popular.<\/p>\n

The senator\u2019s office cites two-thirds support for term limits. PRRI had it at three-quarters last fall, including 67% of Republicans.<\/a> Joe\u2019s numbers from May had it north of 70 percent.<\/a> The range varies by pollster; the direction does not. When we looked at this a few weeks ago<\/a>, 65% of Americans backed 18-year terms \u2014 including 61% of independents and 56% of Republicans \u2014 against the backdrop of confidence in the Court hitting a record low<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The cosponsor list is Hirono, Merkley, Welch, Schatz, Gillibrand, Schiff, and Murray. All Democrats, which remains the entire problem. The United States is one of five countries<\/a> on earth with life tenure for its highest court, and 49 of 50 states limit their own top judges through terms, elections, or mandatory retirement ages. <\/p>\n

Listen, this bill isn\u2019t going anywhere fast. But\u2026 man, that polling keeps moving in one direction, the Court keeps supplying the reasons, and eventually the arithmetic of a proposal that a majority of Republican voters support is going to get awkward for the GOP leadership.<\/p>\n

Earlier:<\/strong> Supreme Court Term Limits Are The Least Dangerous, Most Necessary Reform On The Menu<\/a> <\/p>\n

New Poll Shows Americans \u2014 Even Republicans \u2014 Think The Supreme Court Needs To Be Reined In<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

\"\"Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of\u00a0The Jabot podcast<\/a>, and co-host of\u00a0Thinking Like A Lawyer<\/a>. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email\u00a0her<\/a>\u00a0with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter\u00a0@Kathryn1<\/a>\u00a0or Bluesky\u00a0@Kathryn1<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sheldon Whitehouse is back with the BATL Act, and this time, the public is standing behind him. Whitehouse, along with Senators Cory Booker, Richard Blumenthal, and Alex Padilla, reintroduced the Supreme Court Biennial Appointments and Term Limits Act today. Same structure as the last two goes: 18-year terms, with the president required to appoint a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":157832,"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-157831","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\/2026\/07\/IMG_5243-1-scaled-e1623338814705-620x568-nphSlw.jpg?fit=620%2C568&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157831","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=157831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/xira.com\/p\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}