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Biden is backing major Supreme Court reforms. Here’s what they would do.
Washington — President Biden on Monday unveiled a trio of proposals to reform the Supreme Court, calling on Congress to pass legislation setting term limits for justices and establish binding, enforceable ethics rules for the nation’s highest court.
Mr. Biden’s proposed reforms come after the Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, issued a series of landmark decisions in recent years that have upended longstanding rulings on abortion, affirmative action in higher education and federal regulatory power.
Those decisions, as well as scrutiny over ethics practices at the high court, have made it a target of Democrats and liberal advocacy groups, who have argued the Supreme Court has undermined public confidence in itself.
Two of Mr. Biden’s three proposed changes — term limits and a binding code of conduct — would require action from Congress, making it highly unlikely they will become law before the president leaves office in January 2025. His third reform is a constitutional amendment that clarifies that no president is immune from prosecution for crimes committed while in office. That proposal is Mr. Biden’s answer to the Supreme Court’s ruling earlier this month finding that former President Donald Trump cannot be prosecuted for official acts taken while in the White House.
Here’s what to know about Mr. Biden’s plan for Supreme Court reform.
What are the president’s proposed Supreme Court changes?
The first measure put forth by Mr. Biden is an amendment to the Constitution called the No One is Above the Law Amendment, which would state that the Constitution doesn’t grant immunity from federal criminal indictment, trial, conviction or sentencing to a former president, according to the White House.
“I share our Founders’ belief that the president’s power is limited, not absolute. We are a nation of laws — not of kings or dictators,” Mr. Biden wrote in an op-ed for the Washington Post about his plan.
The second proposed reform would do away with lifetime appointments for members of the Supreme Court and instead set 18-year term limits. Under Mr. Biden’s plan, the president would appoint a new justice every two years, who would then serve for 18 years.
“Term limits would help ensure that the court’s membership changes with some regularity,” Mr. Biden wrote. “That would make timing for court nominations more predictable and less arbitrary. It would reduce the chance that any single presidency radically alters the makeup of the court for generations to come.”
The president’s third proposal is a binding code of conduct for the Supreme Court, which would require justices in part to disclose gifts, refrain from public political activity and step aside from cases in which they or their spouses have financial or other conflicts of interest.
The Supreme Court implemented ethics rules in November, but it does not include an enforcement mechanism. Mr. Biden called its ethics code “weak and self-enforced.”
Will these be implemented?
It’s highly unlikely Mr. Biden’s proposed changes will be implemented in the coming months. Election Day is just 99 days away and, more importantly, Congress is divided. The president’s plans to impose term limits and a code of conduct would require legislative approval from the House and Senate.
Republicans narrowly control the House, and GOP lawmakers in both chambers of Congress have denounced Democrats’ criticisms of the court, arguing they are part of an effort to delegitimize the Supreme Court following rulings that they dislike. Legislation setting term limits for justices and establishing ethics rules would be unlikely to clear the House, and that’s if Republican leaders allowed a floor vote in the first place.
Additionally, there is a high bar for amending the Constitution. One method for proposing a constitutional amendment requires two-thirds support of both the House and Senate, and another is through a constitutional convention of two-thirds of state legislatures. Ratification requires support from three-fourths of state legislatures.
The Constitution has been amended 27 times, most recently in 1992.
But progressive groups are working to make the Supreme Court a motivating issue for voters in November. Some initiatives rolled out in recent months are aimed not only at helping Democrats hold onto the White House, but also keep control of the Senate and flip the House.
If Democrats were to gain a trifecta, it could clear the way for Congress to enact legislation reforming the Supreme Court. In the Senate, the party would have to significantly widen its majority, since 60 votes are required for legislation to advance.
Why is he rolling these out now?
Mr. Biden forecast his reform proposal during remarks in the Oval Office last week, days after announcing his withdrawal from the 2024 presidential race and endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. The president said changing the Supreme Court is “critical to our democracy.”
Mr. Biden’s comments — and now his plan — marked a significant shift for the president, who resisted calls to endorse court reforms just a few years ago. During the 2020 election, the president declined to back so-called court packing, or adding seats to the Supreme Court, a proposal pushed by liberal advocacy groups.
Mr. Biden instead created a commission to study proposed changes, and the panel approved and submitted its report to him in December 2021. But the president didn’t publicly address the commission’s findings, even as Congress’ focus on the Supreme Court intensified last year amid concerns about its ethics policies. In his Washington Post op-ed, Mr. Biden thanked the commission for its “insightful analysis, which informed some of these proposals.”
Concerns from Democrats in Congress were sparked by reporting about Justice Clarence Thomas’ ties to GOP megadonor Harlan Crow, who paid for trips that the justice did not report on annual financial disclosure forms.
Thomas said he and Crow have been friends for decades, and the justice didn’t believe he was required to report the travel under prior guidelines for personal hospitality. He vowed last year to comply with new rules and listed additional travel provided by Crow on his latest disclosure forms.
Justice Samuel Alito has also faced backlash from Democrats over an upside-down American flag flown outside his Virginia residence in January 2021 and an “Appeal to Heaven” flag displayed outside his New Jersey vacation house in the summer of 2023.
Both types of flags were carried by rioters who breached the U.S. Capitol building on Jan. 6, 2021. Alito has said he was not involved in the displays outside his homes. Instead, the justice told congressional Democrats in May that his wife flew the two flags, and neither of them knew of the meanings ascribed to them in recent years.
Beyond the ethics practices, Democrats have also taken aim at the Supreme Court because of recent decisions from its conservative majority. In June 2022, the court overturned Roe v. Wade, and in June 2023, it rejected affirmative action in higher education.
In its most recent term, it overturned a 40-year-old decision to curtail the regulatory power of federal agencies, dismantled a Trump-era ban on bump stocks and narrowed the scope of a federal obstruction law used to charge scores of Jan. 6 defendants, including Trump.
The Supreme Court also found that former presidents are entitled to immunity from federal prosecution for official acts taken while in Congress, a ruling with significant ramifications for special counsel Jack Smith’s case against Trump.
Citing the landscape surrounding the court, Mr. Biden wrote that “what is happening now is not normal, and it undermines the public’s confidence in the court’s decisions, including those impacting personal freedoms. We now stand in a breach.”
One observer of the current Senate race in Louisiana noted that Sen. Bill Cassidy could lose his reelection bid.
Annie Flanagan for NPR
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Annie Flanagan for NPR
Sen. Bill Cassidy lost Saturday’s Louisiana Republican primary according to a race call by the Associated Press.
Cassidy, who served two terms in the Senate, was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict President Trump after the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol. That vote put him at odds with Trump and his MAGA coalition, ultimately leading Trump to push Rep. Julia Letlow to run against Cassidy.
Cassidy’s bid for a third term was viewed as a test of Trump’s grip on the party–and of what voters want from their representatives in Washington. The primary pitted Cassidy, a veteran lawmaker, former physician and chair of the powerful Senate health committee, against Letlow, a political newcomer and a millennial MAGA loyalist.
A detailed view of a hat that reads, Run Julia Run, is seen at a campaign event for Rep. Julia Letlow (R-LA) on May 6, 2026 in Franklinton, Louisiana.
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A former college administrator, Letlow won a special election in 2021 for the House seat her late husband, Luke, was set to assume before he died from COVID in 2020.
In Congress, Letlow sponsored a bill to collect oral histories from the pandemic and has focused on education and children. She introduced the “Parents Bill of Rights Act,” which would allow parents to review classroom materials like library books and require schools to notify parents if their child requests different pronouns, locker rooms or sports teams.
She also serves on the powerful appropriations committee and has embraced Trump’s agenda.
Letlow, who came first in Saturday’s primary, will face Louisiana state Treasurer John Fleming in the runoff on June 27. Cassidy came in third.
The election result is a victory for President Trump who has put Republican loyalty to the test on the ballot so far this year in Indiana state senate primaries and in Cassidy’s race.
Another major test of Trump’s influence comes in Kentucky’s primary on Tuesday when Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who has found himself at odds with the president, faces a challenger endorsed by Trump.
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Brass bands in Beijing make way for sticker shock at home as Trump returns to escalating inflation
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump returned from the spectacle of a Chinese state visit to a less than welcoming U.S. economy — with the military band and garden tour in Beijing giving way to pressure over how to fix America’s escalating inflation rate.
Consumer inflation in the United States increased to 3.8% annually in April, higher than what he inherited as the Iran war and the Republican president’s own tariffs have pushed up prices. Inflation is now outpacing wage gains and effectively making workers poorer. The Cleveland Federal Reserve estimates that annual inflation could reach 4.2% in May as the war has kept oil and gasoline prices high.
Trump’s time with Chinese leader Xi Jinping appears unlikely to help the U.S. economy much, despite Trump’s claims of coming trade deals. The trip occurred as many people are voting in primaries leading into the November general election while having to absorb the rising costs of gasoline, groceries, utility bills, jewelry, women’s clothing, airplane tickets and delivery services. Democrats see the moment as a political opportunity.
“He’s returning to a dumpster fire,” said Lindsay Owens, executive director of Groundwork Collaborative, a liberal think tank focused on economic issues. “The president will not have the faith and confidence of the American people — the economy is their top issue and the president is saying, ‘You’re on your own.’”
The president’s trip to Beijing and his recent comments that indicated a tone-deafness to voters’ concerns about rising prices have suggested his focus is not on the American public and have undermined Republicans who had intended to campaign on last year’s tax cuts as helping families.
Trump described the trip as a victory, saying on social media that Xi “congratulated me on so many tremendous successes,” as the U.S. president has praised their relationship.
Trump told reporters that Boeing would be selling 200 aircraft — and maybe even 750 “if they do a good job” — to the Chinese. He said American farmers would be “very happy” because China would be “buying billions of dollars of soybeans.”
“We had an amazing time,” Trump said as he flew home on Air Force One, and told Fox News’ Bret Baier in an interview that gasoline prices were just some “short-term pain” and would “drop like a rock” once the war ends.
Inflationary pain is not a factor in how Trump handles Iran
Trump departed from the White House for China by saying the negotiations over the Iran war depended on stopping Tehran from developing nuclear weapons. “I don’t think about Americans’ financial situation. I don’t think about anybody. I think about one thing: We cannot let Iran have a nuclear weapon,” Trump said.
That remark prompted blowback because it suggested to some that Trump cared more about challenging Iran than fighting inflation at home. Trump defended his words, telling Fox News: “That’s a perfect statement. I’d make it again.”
The White House has since stressed that Trump is focused on inflation.
Asked later about the president’s words, Vice President JD Vance said there had been a “misrepresentation” of the remarks. White House spokesman Kush Desai said the “administration remains laser-focused on delivering growth and affordability on the homefront” while indicating actions would be taken on grocery prices.
But as Trump appeared alongside Xi, new reports back home showed inflation rising for businesses and interest rates climbing on U.S. government debt.
His comments that Boeing would sell 200 jets to China caused the company’s stock price to fall because investors had expected a larger number. There was little concrete information offered about any trade agreements reached during the summit, including Chinese purchases of U.S. exports such as liquefied natural gas and beef.
“Foreign policy wins can matter politically, but only if voters feel stability and affordability in their daily lives,” said Brittany Martinez, a former Republican congressional aide who is the executive director of Principles First, a center-right advocacy group focused on democracy issues.
“Midterms are almost always a referendum on cost of living and public frustration, and Republicans are not immune from the same inflation and affordability pressures that hurt Democrats in recent cycles,” she added.
Democrats see Trump as vulnerable
Democratic lawmakers are seizing on Trump’s comments before his trip as proof of his indifference to lowering costs. There is potential staying power of his remarks as Americans head into Memorial Day weekend facing rising prices for the hamburgers and hot dogs to be grilled.
“What Americans do not see is any sympathy, any support, or any plan from Trump and congressional Republicans to lower costs – in fact, they see the opposite,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Thursday.
Vance faulted the Biden administration for the inflation problem even though the inflation rate is now higher than it was when Trump returned to the White House in January 2025 with a specific mandate to fix it.
“The inflation number last month was not great,” Vance said Wednesday, but he then stressed, “We’re not seeing anything like what we saw under the Biden administration.”
Inflation peaked at 9.1% in June 2022 under Biden, a Democrat. By the time Trump took the oath of office, it was a far more modest 3%.
Trump’s inflation challenge could get harder
The data tells a different story as higher inflation is spreading into the cost of servicing the national debt.
Over the past week, the interest rate charged on 10-year U.S. government debt jumped from 4.36% to 4.6%, an increase that implies higher costs for auto loans and mortgages.
“My fear is that the layers of supply shocks that are affecting the U.S. economy will only further feed into inflationary pressures,” said Gregory Daco, chief economist at EY-Parthenon.
Daco noted that last year’s tariff increases were now translating into higher clothing prices. With the Supreme Court ruling against Trump’s ability to impose tariffs by declaring an economic emergency, his administration is preparing a new set of import taxes for this summer.
Daco stressed that there have been a series of supply shocks. First, tariffs cut into the supply of imports. In addition, Trump’s immigration crackdown cut into the supply of foreign-born workers. Now, the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz has cut off the vital waterway used to ship 20% of global oil supplies.
“We’re seeing an erosion of growth,” Daco said.
Dr. Tracy Beth Hoeg, the Food and Drug Administration’s top drug regulator, said she was fired from the agency Friday after she declined to resign.
She said she did not know who had ordered her firing or why, nor whether Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. knew of her fate. The Department of Health and Human Services did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The departure reflected the upheaval at the F.D.A., days after the resignation of Dr. Marty Makary, the agency commissioner. Dr. Makary had become a lightning rod for critics of the agency’s decisions to reject applications for rare disease drugs and to delay a report meant to supply damaging evidence about the abortion drug mifepristone. He also spent months before his departure pushing back on the White House’s requests for him to approve more flavored vapes, the reason he ultimately cited for leaving.
Dr. Hoeg’s hiring had startled public health leaders who were familiar with her track record as a vaccine skeptic, and she played a leading role in some of the agency’s most divisive efforts during her tenure. She worked on a report that purportedly linked the deaths of children and young adults to Covid vaccines, a dossier the agency has not released publicly. She was also the co-author of a document describing Mr. Kennedy’s decision to pare the recommendations for 17 childhood vaccines down to 11.
But in an interview on Friday, Dr. Hoeg said she “stuck with the science.”
“I am incredibly proud of the work we were doing,” Dr. Hoeg said, adding, “I’m glad that we didn’t give in to any pressures to approve drugs when it wasn’t appropriate.”
As the director of the agency’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, she was a political appointee in a role that had been previously occupied by career officials. An epidemiologist who was trained in the United States and Denmark, she worked on efforts to analyze drug safety and on a panel to discuss the use of serotonin reuptake inhibitors, the most widely prescribed class of antidepressants, during pregnancy. She also worked on efforts to reduce animal testing and was the agency’s liaison to an influential vaccine committee.
She made sure that her teams approved drugs only when the risk-benefit balance was favorable, she said.
The firing worsens the leadership vacuum at the F.D.A. and other agencies, with temporary leaders filling the role of commissioner, food chief and the head of the biologics center, which oversees vaccines and gene therapies. The roles of surgeon general and director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are also unfilled.
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