quote:

Originally posted by Flashlightboy:
This morning Justice Roberts confirmed the draft is authentic but that it isn't the final product.

As I understand the process, the court circulates drafts to see who agrees with what before a final opinion comes out and my guess is that the leaked document is such a draft.

The far bigger problem is the ultra small circle of SCOTUS justices, clerks and staff and who leaked. The damage is irreversible and will taint the court as an institution for years.

They circulate drafts, and revise and tweak them as the process continues.

So this interim draft is not the final product. This is important because the final majority opinion IS THE LAW. They don't want prior versions circulating as they can be used later to cause confusion and more debate about what the law is. Instead of referring to the final version, people will be considering the draft and what it may imply.

^^^^^ The leaker will be discovered, and if a lawyer, will be disbarred and never able to work in the Law again. If not a lowyer, will be fired and blackballed from any employment within the legal profession. I don't think jail time would be involved, because I don't think there is any law specifically forbidding such leakage.

I agree that the leak was unprecedented and a very grave matter. The deliberations of the Justices are kept under wraps for a reason--the arguments run back and forth a lot and only the final result is effective--premature exposure of the process is detrimental to it.

Although I hope the final decision is in line with the leaked version, I am appalled that a leak occurred. Punishment must be swift and harsh.

flashguy

It’ll end up like Hunter Biden’s laptop… Buried for 18 months to two years. Hell, it’s still being denied. I wouldn’t be surprised as someone else said RE alphabet agencies fueling the fire. Where do you think the media gets his talking points every day?

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It is possible that the draft opinion document was not leaked by anyone at the SCOTUS, but rather obtained by way of a computer hack.

I expect the leak investigation will consider a compromised SCOTUS computer system and not just hunt down a person within the Court.

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Excellent point.

It was the Russians!!!

As with any leak/breach of confidentiality, it was some shit starting numbskull getting wet at the thought of being “THAT” person.

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lol, maybe it was the Russians probably not this time since they got caught breaking into the Court's computers last year.

It's possible the Court's computers have been hacked as the Court has historically had to beg Congress for funds to keep it protected and robust to support their normal activities.

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In all seriousness, I can think of several reasons why the Russians (Communists) would like the abortion rate to drop in the US, so for reasons I mentioned above I doubt they would be behind the leak.
Influencing the Court to overturn Roe if they had that capability? Sure (but extremely unlikely to be possible).
Stirring up and motivating the pro-choice electorate? Nah.

quote:

Originally posted by Leemur:
As with any leak/breach of confidentiality, it was some shit starting numbskull getting wet at the thought of being “THAT” person.

Correct, and they will spend 3 years as the legal scholar to some save the whales/ kill the pipeline nut ball group and will go to far and be cast out for life and end up as a booking agent for Greta Thurnburg

The court's term will for this year will expire tomorrow, Wednesday. I would like for them to enter their final opinion for this case on Thursday. That way it would be out there in it's final version and would lessen the impact for the mid-term elections.

Thoughts on the idea that departing Justice Breyer is perhaps the leaker? Of anybody who has access, he probably has the least to loose, right?

*I know near nothing of the man, just a thought I had

Good start, but now they've got over 100 years of judicial activism to work on reversing on many subjects from the 2nd and 4th amendments onward to things such as the interstate commerce clause.

quote:

Originally posted by Ogie:
The court's term will for this year will expire tomorrow, Wednesday. I would like for them to enter their final opinion for this case on Thursday. That way it would be out there in it's final version and would lessen the impact for the mid-term elections.

Yes absolutely. The final ruling should be published as soon as possible now. Get it over with.

As far as the leaker, it is very likely a radical staffer of Sonia Sotomayor.

No he has a lot to lose like his pension...$265k / yr for the rest of his life

quote:

Originally posted by thumperfbc:
Thoughts on the idea that departing Justice Breyer is perhaps the leaker? Of anybody who has access, he probably has the least to loose, right?

*I know near nothing of the man, just a thought I had

Amit Jain, a clerk for Justice Sotomayor, is reported to be the individual responsible for leaking Justice Alito’s draft opinion.

Constitution doesn't say anything about abortion, should go to the States.

Leaker should be tarred and feathered. Not the nice way, the boiling hot way.

quote:

Amit Jain

Speculative... but...
Matt Wolking
@MattWolking
A person called Amit Jain clerks for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

As a Yale student, Jain blasted Yale for supporting Brett Kavanaugh's nomination.

Jain was quoted in a 2017 Politico piece by Josh Gerstein.

Today, Gerstein published the draft SCOTUS opinion on Roe.

John Roberts’ Cowardice On Obamacare Is Why The Left Thinks It Can Bully and Extort SCOTUS

With the leak of the purported Dobbs opinion now public, Roberts’ actions have placed a target on the backs of his conservative colleagues.

In a matter of hours, Washington D.C. and the political world have erupted in chaos. On Monday evening, Politico published a report of an alleged leaked draft of a majority U.S. Supreme Court decision that would strike down Roe v. Wade, the 1973 court case that federally legalized abortion in the United States.

Writing for the majority in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, Justice Samuel Alito’s alleged draft opinion describes the irrationality of the 1973 ruling, reportedly stating that “Roe was egregiously wrong from the start.”

“We hold that Roe and Casey must be overruled,” writes Alito. “It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives.”

According to the bombshell report, the leak came from a “person familiar with the court’s deliberations,” with the source also claiming that “four of the other Republican-appointed justices – Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett – had voted with Alito in the conference held among the justices after hearing oral arguments in December, and that line-up remains unchanged as of this week.”

Although the identity of the leaker currently remains unclear, this person’s intended goal is fairly obvious. In disseminating the alleged Dobbs opinion before its scheduled release, the leaker is seeking to generate a firestorm of vitriol from left-wing activists directed at the court’s Republican-appointed justices, in the hopes that some will switch their position before the final opinion is released.

While such tactics are despicable and completely destroy the long-held and respected inner workings of the high court, it’s not surprising given that previous public pressure campaigns have worked in swaying justices in other highly political cases, with Chief Justice John Roberts being the most notable.

In the 2012 NFIB v. Sebelius decision on Obamacare, for instance, Roberts joined the leftists on the court to uphold the Affordable Care Act (ACA), with the chief justice ruling that the federal government has the power to force citizens to purchase health insurance under its power to tax.

“The Affordable Care Act is constitutional in part and unconstitutional in part. The individual mandate cannot be upheld as an exercise of Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause,” Roberts wrote. “In this case, however, it is reasonable to construe what Congress has done as increasing taxes on those who have a certain amount of income, but choose to go without health insurance. Such legislation is within Congress’s power to tax.”

The faulty legal reasoning was not Roberts’ original position on the matter. According to “The Chief,” a book written by longtime SCOTUS reporter Joan Biskupic, Roberts initially had sided with his conservative colleagues in striking down Obamacare, “on the grounds that it went beyond Congress’s power to regulate interstate commerce.”

Fears over potential public blowback for such a decision, however, prompted Roberts to operate as a politician, with Biskupic noting how “he felt ‘torn between his heart and his head'” over striking down the ACA.

“After trying unsuccessfully to find a middle way with [Justice Anthony] Kennedy, who was ‘unusually firm’ and even ‘put off’ by the courtship, Roberts turned to the Court’s two moderate liberals, Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan,” a review of the book published in The Atlantic reads. “The threesome negotiated a compromise decision that upheld the ACA’s individual mandate under Congress’s taxing power, while striking down the Medicaid expansion.”

The book seemingly confirms reporting from CBS News’ Jan Crawford, who in her 2012 story of Roberts’ Obamacare flip-flop noted how the chief justice “pays attention to media coverage” and “is sensitive to how the court is perceived by the public.”

While Roberts may have thought his last-minute switch to save Obamacare was a bid to maintain peace in politics, it actually did the exact opposite. Roberts’ spinelessness in the 2012 ACA decision was not only unconstitutional garbage, but it also revealed to the neo-Marxist left that the court can be influenced in high-profile cases if there’s enough public outcry waiting in the wings.

With the leak of the purported Dobbs opinion now public, Roberts’ actions have placed a target on the backs of his conservative colleagues, with threats of violence and harassment from leftists on the way. Whether he wants to believe it or not, his decision to play politician has jeopardized the independence of the court for years to come.

https://thefederalist.com/2022...y-and-extort-scotus/

All of the dims commenting on the leak today, they appear unmotivated to condemn the leak and make no pledges or appeals for investigations.