3 times Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg dissed Donald Trump
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg doesn’t like President Donald Trump.
In an interview with the BBC published last week, Ginsburg said the U.S. is “not experiencing the best of times” under Trump, another subtle dig from the judge against the commander-in-chief.
Defending a free press
In the BBC News interview, Ginsburg stepped up to defend the free press, a favorite target of Trump’s. “I read the New York Times and the Washington Post every day, and I think that the reporters are trying to tell the public the way things are,” she said.
The Times was, among others, recently barred from attending a press gaggle by White House press secretary Sean Spicer, and the Trump campaign blocked the Post from attending campaign events from June to September last year.
"[The Watergate scandal] might never have come out if we didn't have the free press that we do,” she added.
Ginsburg called the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II “a dreadful mistake,” another possible jab at the president. Some of Trump’s political opponents have drawn parallels between his proposed plan to create a Muslim registry with the U.S.’s treatment of Japanese-Americans during the war.
For his part, Trump said he might have supported the internment of more than 100,000 U.S. citizens. “I would have had to be there at the time,” he told Time.
Fashionable dissent
After Trump won the election in November, Ginsburg wore her “dissenting collar” to the court, a collar she wears to signify she is dissenting in cases. But no decision was being handed down that day, leading court watchers to speculate whether Ginsburg was expressing disapproval of the result of the election.
As the Supreme Court is meant to be independent of politics, Ginsberg did not declare a favorite in the election. But she was appointed by Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton’s husband, President Bill Clinton, in 1993.
"Faker"
In July of last year, Ginsburg openly criticized Trump, calling him “a faker,” a highly unusual move for a sitting justice.
"He has no consistency about him," Ginsburg said. "He says whatever comes into his head at the moment. He really has an ego.”
Ginsburg was criticized by the right and the left for her comments, and later said she regretted them.
