Joe Biden used his State of the Union address to call out the conservative Supreme Court for deciding cases, well, conservatively.
The court is split 6-3 in favor of conservatives and, as we all know (although Biden appears to have forgotten), presidents fill vacancies on the Supreme Court. In February 2016, Associate Justice Antonin Scalia died suddenly and then-President Barack Obama nominated Merrick Garland to fill the seat.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell used every parliamentary trick in the book to prevent Garland from getting a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing and a vote on the Senate floor to confirm him.
What became known unofficially as “The Biden Rule” — so-called because Biden suggested in 1992 that President Bush should wait until after the election to fill a Supreme Court vacancy if one came up — allowed Trump to name the first of three Supreme Court justices, tipping the court to the right.
So Biden attacked the Supreme Court for following the dictates of their conscience and the law.
“Its decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court majority wrote the following — and with all due respect, justices — ‘Women are not without electoral — electoral power’ — excuse me — ‘electoral or political power,’” he said
“You’re about to realize just how much you were right about that,” he added, The justices were sitting in front of the podium on the floor of the House chamber.
Some might conclude that it was an effort to intimidate the justices. At least, that’s what the media would say if Trump made a comment about a decision he disagreed with with the justices sitting 10 feet away.
Instead, it’s a rarity that a president calls out the Supreme Court. And Florida Republican Rep. Byron Donalds didn’t like it at all.
“I found his scolding of the court disgusting, because the left will say that they want to respect the institution, except when they don’t get their way,” Donalds said in a Fox News “Sunday Morning Futures” interview with Maria Bartiromo.
“And then, when they don’t get their way, they want to call out Supreme Court justices in front of the world. That was outrageous,” he said. “There was a reason why not the entire Supreme Court was not there, because I think they understood they didn’t want to be subjected to Joe Biden’s foolishness.”
Donalds also called out Biden for the rabidly partisan nature of the address. Sure, he’s running for re-election and all, but the personal, vindictive attacks on Republicans were shocking coming from a man who constantly talks about “bipartisanship.”
“I have never seen a speech like this, where the opposition party from the president’s party did not stand for an hour in that speech,” he said. “It was partisan. It was a campaign speech.”
“He was trying to prove himself to his political base because they have serious questions about his ability,” he continued. “And, frankly, they should have serious questions about his ability.”
“It was not about the United States of America,” Donalds continued. “It was not addressing the true state of the union, which is unraveling a bunch of the policies of Joe Biden, because they have been disastrous for America.”
Indeed, the last thing Biden wanted to talk about was the true state of the union. Instead, he scorched his political opponents for a bunch of cheap applause lines.
Not a very edifying speech for the president of the United States to deliver.