Politics
Supreme Court chief justice report urges caution on use of AI ahead of contentious election year
With a wary eye over the future of the federal courts, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts warned Sunday of the perils of artificial intelligence (AI) when deciding cases and other important legal matters.
His remarks came in the annual year-end report issued by the head of the federal judiciary, which made no mention of current controversies surrounding his court, including calls for greater transparency and ethics reform binding the justices.
Noting the legal profession in general is “notoriously averse to change,” Roberts urged a go-slow approach when embracing new technologies by the courts.
“AI obviously has great potential to dramatically increase access to key information for lawyers and non-lawyers alike,” he said. “But just as obviously it risks invading privacy interests and dehumanizing the law.”
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Street view of the Supreme Court building. (STEFANI REYNOLDS/AFP via Getty Images)
“But any use of AI requires caution and humility,” he added. “As 2023 draws to a close with breathless predictions about the future of Artificial Intelligence, some may wonder whether judges are about to become obsolete. I am sure we are not— but equally confident that technological changes will continue to transform our work.”
Roberts also summarized the work of the nation’s 94 district courts, 13 circuit courts and his own Supreme Court. Previous year-end reports have focused on courthouse security, judges’ pay, rising caseloads and budgets.
The chief justice’s predictions of the future did not include his own court’s caseload, as he and his colleagues are poised to tackle several politically-charged disputes in the new year, many focused on former president Donald Trump’s legal troubles and re-election efforts.
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Chief Justice John Roberts attends the State of the Union address. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
Election examinations
The Supreme Court has tackled its share of election fights over the decades — remember Bush v. Gore nearly a quarter century ago? — but 2024 promises to make that judicial drama look quaint by comparison.
First up could be whether states can keep Trump’s name off primary and general election ballots. Colorado’s highest court said yes, and now the U.S. Supreme Court is being asked to decide the extent of a 14th Amendment provision that bans from office those who “engaged in insurrection.”
State courts across the country are considering whether Trump’s role in 2020 election interference and the Jan. 6 Capitol riots would disqualify him from seeking re-election.
The justices are being asked to decide the matter quickly, either by mid-February or early March, when the “Super Tuesday” primaries in 16 states are held.
In his leadership role as “first among equals,” the 68-year-old Roberts will likely be the key player in framing what voting disputes his court will hear and ultimately decide, perhaps as the deciding vote.
Despite a 6-3 conservative majority, the chief justice has often tried to play the middle, seeking a less-is-best approach that has frustrated his more right-leaning colleagues.
But despite any reluctance to stay away from the fray, the court, it seems, will be involved in election-related controversies.
“Given the number of election disputes it might be coming, a lot of them could be moving very quickly and will be very important to see what the court does,” said Brianne Gorod, chief counsel at the Constitutional Accountability Center. “Sometimes the Supreme Court has no choice but to be involved in the election cases, because there are some voting rights and election cases that the justices are required to resolve on the merits.”
Already the high court is considering redistricting challenges to voting boundaries in GOP-leaning states, brought by civil rights groups.
That includes South Carolina’s first congressional district and claims the Republican-led legislature created a racial gerrymander. A ruling is expected in spring 2024.
The high court could also be asked to weigh in on emergency appeals over vote-by-mail restrictions, provisional ballots deadlines, polling hours, the Electoral College and more.
Just weeks before President Trump’s first House impeachment in 2019, Roberts tried to downplay his court’s consideration of partisan political disputes.
“When you live in a polarized political environment, people tend to see everything in those terms,” Roberts said at the time. “That’s not how we at the court function and the results in our cases do not suggest otherwise.”
But the court’s reputation as a fair arbiter of the law and Constitution has continued to erode to all-time lows.
A Fox News poll in June found just 48% of those surveyed having confidence in the Supreme Court, down from 83% just six years ago.
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Former President Donald Trump on the campaign trail. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)
The Trump term?
Donald Trump faces separate criminal prosecution in four jurisdictions in 2024 — two federal cases over document mishandling and 2020 election interference; and two state cases in Georgia over 2020 election interference and New York over hush money payments to a porn star.
The prospect of a former president and leading GOP candidate facing multiple criminal convictions — with or without the blessing of the United States Supreme Court — has the potential to dominate an already riven election campaign.
The former president has filed various motions in each case, seeking to drop charges, delay the proceedings, and be allowed to speak publicly at what he sees as politically-motivated prosecutions.
The Supreme Court recently refused to fast-track a separate appeal, over Trump’s scheduled criminal trial scheduled to start the day before “Super Tuesday.”
Special counsel Jack Smith is challenging Trump’s claim of presidential immunity in the 2020 election interference case. The former president says the prosecutions amount to a “partisan witch hunt.”
While the justices are staying out of the dispute for now, they could quickly jump back in later this winter, after a federal appeals court decides the merits in coming weeks.
But the justices will decide this term whether some January 6 Capitol riot defendants can challenge their convictions for “corruptly” obstructing “official proceedings.” Oral arguments could be held in February or March.
More than 300 people are facing that same obstruction law over their alleged efforts to disrupt Congress’ certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory over Trump.
The former president faces the same obstruction count in his case, and what the high court decides could affect Trump’s legal defense in the special counsel prosecution, and the timing of his trial.
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Supreme Court Justices posing for an official photo at the Supreme Court. (Photo by OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images)
Look ahead
In the short term, the Supreme Court, with its solid conservative majority, will hear arguments and issue rulings in coming months on hot-button topics like:
– Abortion, and access to mifepristone, a commonly-used drug to end pregnancies
– Executive power, and an effort to sharply curb the power of federal agencies to interpret and enforce “ambiguous” policies enacted by Congress
– Social media, and whether tech firms — either on their own or with the cooperation of the government — can moderate or prevent users from posting disinformation
– Gun rights and a federal ban on firearm possession by those subject to domestic violence restraining orders
Off the bench, the court last month instituted a new “code of conduct” — ethics rules to clarify ways the justices can address conflicts of interest, case recusals, activities they can participate in outside the court and their finances.
It followed months of revelations that some justices, particularly Clarence Thomas, did not accurately report gifts and other financial benefits on their required financial disclosure reports.
The court in a statement admitted the absence of binding ethics rules led some to believe that the justices “regard themselves as unrestricted by any ethics rules.”
“To dispel this misunderstanding, we are issuing this code, which largely represents a codification of principles that we have long regarded as governing our conduct.”
All this reflects the delicate balancing act the chief justice will navigate in a presidential election year.
The unprecedented criticism of the high court’s work — on and off the bench — is not lost on its nine members.
“There’s a storm around us in the political world and the world at large in America,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh said this fall. “We, as judges and the legal system, need to try to be a little more, I think, of the calm in the storm.”
Some court watchers agree the court as an institution may struggle in the near term to preserve its legitimacy and public confidence, but time might be on its side.
“By its nature, the court kind of takes a long-term view of things,” said Thomas Dupree, a former top Justice Department official, who has litigated cases before the Supreme Court. “Even when we disagree with the outcome in a particular case, I have never had any doubt that these are men and women who are doing their absolute best to faithfully apply the laws and the Constitution of the United States to reach the right result.”
Democrats are struggling to respond to a major redistricting setback in Virginia, with some party leaders discussing an audacious and possibly far-fetched idea for trying to restore a congressional map voided by the court but showing little indication they have a clear plan.
During a private discussion on Saturday that included Democratic House members from Virginia and Representative Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the minority leader, the lawmakers vented anger at their defeat at the Virginia Supreme Court, spoke about a collective determination to flip two or three Republican-held seats under the existing map and discussed a bank-shot proposal to redraw the congressional lines anyway, according to three people who participated in the call and two others who were briefed on it.
They did not land on a specific course forward, and Mr. Jeffries and the other members of Congress agreed to consult with their lawyers about the most prudent way to proceed, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe a private talk.
The conversation reflected the desperation and fury that have gripped the party after the state Supreme Court struck down a favorable map that had been ratified by voters. The most dramatic idea they discussed — which would involve an unusual gambit to replace the entire state Supreme Court, with a goal of reinstating their gerrymandered map — drew mixed reactions on the call, said the people, and it was not clear that it would even be viable, or palatable to Gov. Abigail Spanberger and Democrats in the Virginia General Assembly.
After Democrats had fought Republicans to a rough draw last month in a nationwide gerrymandering war, a pair of recent court rulings quickly gave the G.O.P. the clear upper hand in the race to redraw maps ahead of the midterm elections. Facing stiff headwinds, including President Trump’s low approval ratings and high gas prices, Republicans are looking for every advantage they can find to defy the odds and hold on to their narrow majority.
Any plans to enact a new congressional map for this year’s midterm elections would require action in the next few days. In a court filing last month, Steven Koski, the commissioner of the Virginia Department of Elections, said any changes to the maps after Tuesday, May 12, “will significantly increase the risk” of his agency being unable to properly prepare for the state’s scheduled Aug. 4 primary election.
A spokesman for Mr. Jeffries declined to comment.
Scott Surovell, the majority leader of the Virginia Senate, declined to comment on Saturday evening. Don Scott, the speaker of the state House of Delegates, said in an interview that he had not spoken to Mr. Jeffries or members of the congressional delegation about the multistep proposal that came up in the discussion.
One key to the plan would be having Democrats in Richmond lower the mandatory retirement age for state Supreme Court justices, an idea that began circulating among state lawmakers and members of Congress after a column proposing a version of the idea was published on Friday night in The Downballot, a progressive newsletter.
Ms. Spanberger would have to sign off on any legislation that lowered the judicial retirement age. She has not been briefed on the proposal, the people involved in the discussion or briefed on it said. Her spokeswoman, Libby Wiet, declined to comment.
The first step in the process, as discussed on the delegation’s call, would be to invoke a January ruling by a circuit court judge in Tazewell County, Va., that said the 2026 constitutional amendment effort to redraw the maps was invalid because county officials did not post notice of it at courthouses and other public locations three months before a general election.
Democrats would aim to use that ruling to seek to invalidate the earlier constitutional amendment that created the state’s independent redistricting commission by arguing that courthouses across the state did not post notice of it at the time. That would give the legislature the authority to enact a map of its choosing.
Ensuring the plan proceeds would involve the General Assembly, which is controlled by Democrats, lowering the mandatory retirement age for Virginia’s Supreme Court from 75 to 54, the age of the youngest current justice, or less. Virginia judges are appointed by the General Assembly, where Democrats hold majorities in both chambers and could then fill vacancies on the court with sympathetic Democratic lawyers.
Mandatory retirement ages are in place for judges in 32 states and Washington, D.C., according to a 2015 law review article from the Duke University Law School. The article said the most common retirement age set by states is 70.
In states such as Arizona, Georgia and Utah, Republican lawmakers have expanded state Supreme Courts in order to make them more conservative. But the Virginia proposal, which would get rid of all the sitting judges, would go considerably further.
Former Representative James P. Moran, Democrat of Virginia, said a move to stack the Virginia Supreme Court would be “just a bridge too far” and could backfire on his party.
He said he understood that many Democrats felt that their party “needs to fight back and not just be victims of unparalleled aggression.” But, he added: “We do have to keep our credibility. We have to do things that pass the legitimacy test.”
Representative Suhas Subramanyam, a Democrat who represents Loudoun County, Va., said in an interview that he supported doing whatever was necessary to preserve the map voters approved in last month’s referendum — including replacing the state’s Supreme Court justices.
“Everyone has got to have a strong stomach right now; this is a complete disaster waiting to happen if people are timid,” said Mr. Subramanyam, who was on the Saturday call. “We have Republican states ignoring their constitutions and interrupting early voting and ignoring their Supreme Courts all together. We know based on that, Republicans would explore every single option possible to move this forward.”
On Friday, Democratic legislative leaders in Virginia signaled that they planned to appeal the state Supreme Court ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court. But some legal experts believe the state court ruling could be the final word on the matter, because it does not involve federal law or the U.S. Constitution.
Mr. Jeffries has maintained throughout the redistricting battles over the last year that he would maintain all options for creating or preserving Democratic House districts and has said repeatedly that Democrats would employ “maximum warfare, everywhere, all the time.”
In an interview on Friday night, before his Saturday meeting with Virginia lawmakers, Mr. Jeffries said he was “exploring how to unravel this decision.”
“It’s an all-hands-on-deck moment, and it’s unprecedented in American history as far as we can tell that an actual election has been overturned by a handful of unelected judges,” Mr. Jeffries said. “We’re not going to step back, we will continue to fight back.”
Tim Balk contributed reporting.
Politics
Trump-backed Board of Peace, Israel ‘will take action’ if Hamas remains out of compliance: Netanyahu advisor
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Michael Eisenberg, a top advisor to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, says Israel and the newly-created Board of Peace will “take action” against Hamas if it does not comply with the peace terms it agreed to.
Eisenberg made the comments during an interview with Fox News on Sunday. He said Hamas is currently out of compliance with a wider peace agreement and is refusing to give up its weapons to “demilitarize” Gaza.
“I think all the options are on the table since Hamas is noncompliant with the 20-point plan, and they haven’t delivered their weapons like they were supposed to. And so we’ll have to wait and see. But like I said, this is incredibly well thought out. Give President Trump a tremendous amount of credit and his team of people credit. They’ve literally thought through every stage of this from beginning to end,” Eisenberg said.
“And by the way, and as President Trump said, there’s an easy way and a hard way. Everyone prefers the easy way, which is Hamas. With the help of the mediators delivers the weapons, but if they don’t, there’s a hard way too.,” he added.
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President Donald Trump (L) greets Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as he arrives at the White House. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Eisenberg went on to say that Iran must also eventually give up control over Gaza under the 20-pont plan agreed to between the U.S., Israel and Hamas.
“Hamas is still there. But the 20-point plan says they cannot be there. They cannot be a part of government. They cannot bear arms. They have to become Swedish, basically, in order for them to stay in any role in Gaza. And so I suggest they do that sooner rather than later. And I think progress is slow. You can’t microwave a 30-year problem. It doesn’t work. Sociologists,” he said.
Eisenberg’s comments come amid multiple peace negotiations across the Middle East. Israel is hashing out an agreement to deal with Hezbollah in Lebanon and the U.S. is in talks with Iran.
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Netanyahu said last week that Israel and the United States remain in “full coordination” as negotiations continue.
“We share common objectives, and the most important objective is the removal of the enriched material from Iran, all the enriched material, and the dismantling of Iran’s enrichment capabilities,” Netanyahu said at the opening of a security cabinet meeting.
On the nuclear issue, former Israeli National Security Advisor Yaakov Amidror said Israel’s position remains uncompromising.
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“Weaponized uranium must leave Iran,” Amidror said. “The Iranians must not be allowed to enrich uranium.”
Alongside the nuclear issue, Israeli analysts say Iran’s ballistic missile program has become equally central to Israel’s security concerns.
WASHINGTON — As Kamala Harris eyes a possible 2028 presidential bid, there is little outward enthusiasm among her biggest 2024 backers to fund a repeat performance, adding to uncertainty about the former vice president’s prospects in what is sure to be a crowded primary field.
The Times reached out to more than two dozen top donors to the biggest pro-Harris super PAC in 2024. Several of them said they do not plan to support her should she choose to run, or declined to talk about her. Others did not respond.
“I don’t think it’s a helpful narrative [for 2028] to start with the 2024 hangover,” said one fundraiser for Harris’ 2024 campaign, who requested anonymity to speak candidly. “There is an enormous appetite for new blood — something fresh, something that really represents the future, not the past.”
That narrative is poised to present Harris’ biggest challenge if she decides to run — particularly if it jeopardizes her ability to pull in crucial funding. Though few in the party want to criticize Harris, few appear inclined to endorse her, and conversations about her prospects often come down to one thing: Democrats’ anxiety about winning.
“She’s run, she’s lost, so the question’s going to be, is there somebody that gives Democratic voters more of a sense that they could win?” said Dick Harpootlian, a longtime South Carolina Democratic strategist. “That’s what all of us are looking for. We want to win in ‘28.”
The chatter among party elites appears at odds with recent polling in Harris’ favor, including in April’s Harvard Center for American Political Studies/Harris Poll, which showed Harris leading the Democratic field with support from 50% of Democrats.
The former vice president has also been met with enthusiasm from audiences in a series of recent speaking stops — including when she told a friendly crowd at a New York conference in April that she “might” run for president.
Harris remains undecided about whether to mount a run, according to a person familiar with her thinking, who said Friday she has been focused on boosting Democrats ahead of the midterm elections, meeting voters and delivering messages about the economy and affordability.
If she were to run, Harris would expect a crowded primary field to split donors and would be aware of the need to overcome the perception of skeptics, this person said — but noted that 2028 would afford a very different dynamic than the circumstances under which she took the nomination in 2024.
“There’s a bit of a ‘doth protest too much’ quality to some of these complaints about the idea of her running,” said the person close to her. “It may be a backhanded way of acknowledging that she’d be quite formidable if she decided to get in.”
Speculation about whether Harris would run again — and whether she should — has swirled since her truncated 2024 campaign ended in defeat to Donald Trump. Harris’ decision not to run for California governor in a wide-open race was broadly viewed as signaling presidential ambitions, and she reentered the public eye with the publication of a book about the 2024 campaign and an associated speaking tour.
Last month, Harris gave her strongest signal yet that she could seek the party’s nomination again, telling the Rev. Al Sharpton at a gathering of his civil rights organization in New York that she was “thinking about it.”
“I know what the job is and I know what it requires,” Harris said at the time.
Harris’ 2024 loss to Trump and failure to capture any battleground states — after entering the race late following President Biden’s exit — was bruising for Democrats. The defeat is lingering longer for some top donors than it did after Hillary Clinton’s loss to Trump in 2016, making them extra wary, said one Democratic political consultant.
“Especially in the donor class, everyone feels burnt,” he said. “People just want to turn the page.”
The Times contacted top donors to Future Forward, the Democratic super PAC that spent the most to back Harris in the 2024 election. All the donors contacted gave at least $1 million and some acted as bundlers for the campaign, soliciting big checks from other donors in addition to their own contributions.
Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings, who gave $1 million to Future Forward in 2024, said he hoped to support a different Californian.
“Gavin is the candidate who can motivate both the left and the center,” Hastings told The Times, referring to Gov. Gavin Newsom.
A bundler for both Harris and Biden said it comes down to who can give Democrats the best chance to succeed.
“I think it is too early to pick a favorite in the 2028 race, but Kamala Harris will not be my candidate,” this person said. “I don’t think she would appeal to a swing voter, and we need swing voters to win.”
Others, including a few party leaders, deflected questions by citing a focus on this year’s midterm elections. Rep. James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.), who last year praised Newsom’s presidential prospects during a visit by the governor, said Tuesday that Democrats should be zeroed in on 2026.
“I’m not thinking about 2028, and if she were to call me I wouldn’t talk to her about it,” Clyburn told The Times when asked about Harris’ chances.
Enthusiasm for Harris and skepticism about her viability in 2028 aren’t mutually exclusive, said the former Harris fundraiser.
“A lot of people love her and also don’t think that she is the answer for 2028,” the fundraiser said.
The attitudes of the donor class and political elite may be at odds with those of regular Americans, particularly Black and working-class voters, the Democratic political consultant said. Few of the possible candidates have the potential to excite Black voters the way Harris does, he said.
If a candidate, whether Harris or someone else, makes a successful case that they can win, Black voters will be “strategic and optimistic enough” to rally around whoever it is, said Keneshia Grant, a Howard University political scientist.
But, she said, “I don’t think that they are going to take well to work by elites or the donor class to sideline Harris if there is no clear, reasonable, exciting, Obama-level, yes-we-can candidate instead of her.”
Harris speaks the Public Counsel Awards Dinner on April 29 in Beverly Hills.
(Frazer Harrison / Getty Images)
In recent weeks, Harris has spoken at a fundraiser in South Carolina, a party luncheon in Michigan and a dinner in Arkansas. On Thursday, she was in Nevada to rally Democrats ahead of the midterm primary.
She also joined other likely 2028 contenders at the Colorado Speaker Series in Denver and Sharpton’s conference, accepted an award from the nonprofit Public Counsel at a Los Angeles gala and addressed the National Women’s Law Center gala in Washington to a warm reception, as did Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker.
“She was inspiring, she was hopeful, she pushed back on Trump,” said Jay Parmley, head of the Democratic Party in South Carolina, where Harris spoke at a party-hosted fundraiser in Greenville on April 15.
South Carolina, a key primary state, could help unlock Harris’ path to the nomination. If Black voters there boosted her to a win, she could build early momentum.
But Parmley said he believed she would have to “get over” the hurdle of convincing voters that she can beat the GOP.
“I don’t think it’s a given she wins here without work,” Parmley said. “She’s going to have to really visit with voters and work just like everybody else.”
Times staff writer Ana Ceballos in Washington contributed to this report.
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