As she runs for the U.S. Senate, East Bay Rep. Barbara Lee joined a rally on Sunday calling for four more seats to be added to the Trump-heavy Supreme Court.
It’s becoming a fashionable thing on the political Left to call for expanding the Supreme Court, and it has been since the Amy Coney Barrett nomination was hastily rammed through while Merrick Garland never got a hearing in 2016. The recent ethics problems for Clarence Thomas have even more calling for the court to be expanded. Senator Elizabeth Warren has been saying for years the Court should have seats added, and last week a gaggle of senators formally introduced a bill increase the Supreme Court seats from nine to 13
A few reps from the House of Representatives signed on to that bill as co-sponsors of the House version, one of them being Los Angeles Rep. Adam Schiff. Adam Schiff also happens to be running for the Senate, aspiring to get Dianne Feinstein’s seat. And one of his opponents in that race is East Bay representative Barbara Lee, who is apparently trying to outflank Schiff on the Supreme Court front by herself calling for more justices on the Supreme Court, as NBC Bay Area reports.
"I’ve witnessed political gamesmanship over lifetime appointments, I’ve seen more ethics scandals than I can count," Lee said at a Sunday rally for the Supreme Court reform group Just Majority. "But let me tell you, I’ve never been more fearful for the future of our highest court than I am today.”
As many Democrats are keen to point out these days, the Constitution does not require the current nine-judge arrangement on the court. The number of justices on the court has gone up and down since the court’s first hearings in 1790, though it has remained a nine-judge body since 1869, according to the Bay Area News Group.
Lee also called for term limits for Supreme Court justices, and some sort of oversight for when justices run into ethical problems.
"Through the Judiciary Act we can add four seats to the bench and restore a Supreme Court that is truly representative of the people,” Lee said Sunday.
Image: OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA - MAY 21: Congresswoman Barbara Lee of California speaks at a "Just Majority" nationwide bus tour press conference to call for reforms to the U.S. Supreme Court on May 21, 2023 in Oakland, California. (Photo by Kimberly White/Getty Images for Demand Justice)
