Known as the “5-5-5” plan, it proposes five Democrat-affiliated justices, five Republican-affiliated justices, and five justices chosen by the 10 politically aligned justices to serve shorter, rotating terms. One of the leading court expansion proposals, which was based on a Yale Law Journal article and had support from former Democratic presidential candidates Pete Buttigieg and Beto O’Rourke, involves going from nine justices to 15. Democrats calling for more seats now haven’t specified how many more justices they might want, but the fact that they’re talking about it all shows how much the politics around the court have changed just in the last two years. It’s a strategy that hasn’t had real momentum since 1937, when Franklin Roosevelt unsuccessfully pushed to add up to 15 new justices in the face of a court that repeatedly blocked his New Deal policies. Even if Joe Biden wins the White House and Democrats take the Senate, Democrats fear a solidly conservative court would stand in the way of their political agenda.Įnter court-packing, which would involve Congress passing legislation to add more seats to the nine-justice court. That would give the court’s more conservative wing a 6–3 majority. There is little that Senate Democrats can do to stop a Trump nominee from getting confirmed if the Senate’s Republican majority sticks together. WASHINGTON - The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg - and the prospect of President Donald Trump rushing through a nominee to deepen the court’s conservative majority - has a growing number of Democrats rallying around adding seats to the US Supreme Court.

Incoming senate amy streetjournal