The Supreme Court MAGA majority (clockwise from top left): Roberts, Thomas, Alito, Barrett, Kavanaugh, Gorsuch

Donald Trump has an unrecognized political action committee (PAC). It is the MAGA judges from judge Aileen Cannon in Florida, who is presiding over the stolen classified documents case, to the Supreme Court majority. Let’s start by considering the Supreme Court’s two recent rulings.

On Friday, July 21, the Supreme Court ruled by an 8-1 majority that a state may take a gun away from somebody who is under a restraining order for domestic violence. You might wonder how that is a Trump election victory. Here’s the answer:

Chief (in)Justice John Roberts wrote the majority decision. His decision is wholly inconsistent with what the MAGA majority had ruled in a 2022 decision known as the Bruen decision. In that decision, the court ruled that any gun restriction must be able to find historical precedent. Roberts had concurred in that decision. Clarence Thomas was the sole dissent in today’s ruling. He correctly pointed out: “The court and government do not point to a single historical law revoking a citizen’s Second Amendment right based on possible interpersonal violence.” In other words, Roberts and the othre MAGA (in)Justices reversed their previous position.

What accounts for the change of heart of all the MAGA judges but Thomas? The answer is that the MAGA majority is like Trump. They have enough sense to know that putting guns in the hands of violent wife beaters is not exactly popular. And what would happen if one of these abusers actually went out and shot his wife? The Supreme Court majority and their patron, Donald Trump, would be directly blamed. That is not a vote winner.

Then, just today, the Court ruled on another case: The MAGA majority punted on a case which involved emergency abortion rights for women. In this case, the US Justice Department wants Idaho to comply with federal legislation requiring hospitals to provide emergency medical care. By a 6-3 majority, the Supreme Court allowed stand a lower court ruling requiring Idaho hospitals to provide such care. The three most hard core MAGAists – Gorsuch, Alito and Thomas – dissented. But the real meaning of the ruling was clarified by the newest (in)Justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson. AOL news explained:

“It is delay,” she wrote in her dissent, which she read from the bench. “While this court dawdles and the country waits, pregnant people experiencing emergency medical conditions remain in a precarious position, as their doctors are kept in the dark about what the law requires.”

“The decision, which leaves the legal question unresolved and has no impact in any other state.” In other words, this decision enables any other state to deny emergency abortions to pregnant women.

Why did the MAGA majority punt? Ketanji Brown Jackson is clear. She also wrote: “Will this Court just have a do-over, rehearing and rehashing the same arguments we are considering now, just at a comparatively more convenient point in time?” (emphasis added) It’s clear what she means: Denying women emergency abortions just a few months before the election – and on the day of an important Biden Trump debate – is not a vote winner for the MAGA majority’s patron saint. Better to postpone that decision for after the elections. Brown was alone in her opinion. Liberal (In)Justices Sotomayor and Kagan did not join her. They preferred to maintain the collegial atmosphere that the Supreme Court is supposed to present to the public.

That is close to the approach of Trump himself vs. the evangelicals in his party. The more extreme evangelicals in Trump’s party insist on pushing for a national abortion ban. Trump is more strategic. He takes a states’ rights position – let the states decide. He knows that advocating for a national abortion ban is a vote loser. Delay until he gets into office – that is Trump’s approach and the approach of most of the MAGA judges. The others – especially Clarence Thomas – feel that there is no need compromise in order for Trump to win a majority of electoral votes. They trust the Republican-controlled state legislatures to overturn/fail to recognize state election results. It’s true that in 2020, the Supreme Court threw out Trump’s attempts to overturn the elections. That was then and this is now. Since then, Trump has consolidated his grip on their party. Furthermore, if the election hinges on just one or two states, it will be a lot easier for the MAGA majority to accept the Republicans’ stealing an election this time.

We have dealt here just with these two cases. The Supreme Court MAGA majority is delaying in another way by putting two federal cases against Trump on hold. Those are the Washington DC and the Fulton County, Georgia cases on ice. They are joined in this delay tactic by MAGA judge Aileen Cannon in the Florida classified documents case. Oaklandsocialist will deal with those cases as well as the failure of the Democrats to adequately fight these delays in the court that really matters: The court of public opinion. Stay tuned.