WashingtonThe US president announced on Monday an urgent plan to reform the Supreme Court that seeks to limit the lifetime tenure of judges and impose an ethics code, an ambitious project in his final months in office.
Joe Biden, 81, called for constitutional reform to overturn the recent decision of the Supreme Court, dominated by a majority of conservative judges, regarding Donald Trump.
In July, the United States’ highest court granted broad immunity to former Republican President Donald Trump, who faces several lawsuits and is campaigning to return to the White House in November’s election.
The White House said both Biden, who dropped out of the presidential race due to pressure over his age, and Vice President Kamala Harris, who is emerging as the Democratic nominee, want to work with Congress on the plan.
The project has little chance of being approved by the legislature.
Biden has long refrained from calls to reform the court, which is made up of nine judges appointed for life and currently has six conservative justices, three of them appointed by Trump with the ratification of Congress.
The court has issued other controversial rulings, such as the annulment in 2022 of the 1973 decision allowing the right to abortion, and is also facing a scandal over the integrity of judges.
Limiting the terms of judges “is intended to limit the possibility of a presidency imposing undue influence on future generations,” a statement said.
It also seeks a binding code of ethics that is guaranteed to be enforced, similar to that applied to federal circuit judges.
The bill has little chance of passing the legislature, where Democrats hold a majority in the Senate but Republicans dominate the House of Representatives.
Steven Schwinn, a legal expert at the University of Illinois at Chicago, told AFP that Biden has “almost zero” chance of his plan being approved and that he is probably seeking to “raise public awareness” and raise the issue of the Supreme Court as an electoral matter.
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– 2024-08-01 20:48:59
