The court leans politically conservative but the justices believe in the power of the court as an institution, and thus their own power and authority. They know one of the first things a president Trump would do is weaken the other branches of government, to boost the strength of the executive.
If you had a cushy job with nigh unlimited power, and someone threatened to take it away from you, would you sit back and let them just because they're the one who gave it to you?
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@joshadell but Trump has no authority to do that in part BECAUSE of SCOTUS power.
@volkris What SCOTUS power? There's nothing in the Constitution that gives SCOTUS power to enforce its rulings. SCOTUS has implicit power because its rulings are enforced by the other branches, specifically, by the executive branch. And it would be up to Congress to impeach an executive that ignored those rulings. Good luck.
What about Trump makes you think he would enforce a ruling he didn't like if he thought he could get away with it?
@joshadell Right, so, so much for your claim of a cushy job with nigh unlimited power.
If you want to go the direction of saying SCOTUS doesn't have power to enforce its rulings, well, your previous comment is hung out to dry.
@volkris Nothing I said is contradictory. SCOTUS has power because it typically doesn't have to deal with an executive that won't enforce it's rulings. As long as everyone plays by the established rules and norms (which has been the case for most of US history), they have a huge amount of power. Trump is an aberration, and a threat to them. Self-preservation is strong. I don't think it's guaranteed they'll rule in his favor just because they're conservative, like so many are worried about.
@joshadell I recently heard somebody ask, " What power?"
You were right when that was the position you took.
