By Zachary Mettler,
Inanity isn’t confined to one side of the political aisle. Tuesday’s congressional hearing, where Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Elena Kagan defended the Supreme Court’s budget request for additional security, made that clear.
Justice Barrett poignantly expressed her gratitude for the Supreme Court police, who interrupted a swatting incident in May at her home in Fairfax, Virginia. She also shared her newly adopted practice of wearing a bulletproof vest due to intensifying threats on her life.
“I didn’t expect that performing this service would put me in the position of explaining to my children what a bulletproof vest was, why I had to wear one,” she said.
Instead of prompting sentiments of gratitude towards Justice Barrett, who, even with seven children, chose to accept a high calling of public service in the face of danger, one prominent conservative radio host told her to “go back to the kitchen” if she “can’t stand the heat.”
After simmering below the surface, conservatives’ displeasure with Justice Barrett exploded on the last day of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2026 term.
The Court handed down a 5-4 decision in Trump v. Barbara, decreeing all children born in the United States — including children of illegal aliens and temporary visitors — are citizens of the country upon birth. Chief Justice John Roberts authored the opinion, joined by Justices Barrett, Kagan, Sotomayor and Jackson.
“It turns out that Amy Coney Barrett is a DEI hire, little better than Ketanji Jackson,” the Daily Wire host Matt Walsh vented. “Terrible pick. When’s the last time we had a Republican president who didn’t put a liberal justice on the court?” Walsh continued: “The worst Supreme Court Justices of all time have all been women. That’s just a fact.”
Rep. Nancy Mace went so far as to call for Barrett to be “removed from the Bench.”
“Everyone pile on Barrett” hot takes generate a lot of heat (and clicks) but no light. Many conservatives, justifiably frustrated with the Court’s decision, have checked their reason at the door and let their passions run wild.
To take the totally unserious idea that Justice Barrett is comparable to Justice Jackson, seriously, let’s recall Justice Barrett’s greatest hits.
In 2022, Justice Barrett joined the Court’s 5-4 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. She also joined the Court’s 6-3 ruling in favor of Coach Joe Kennedy, protecting his free speech rights and overturning the Lemon test.
In 2023, Justice Barrett joined the Court’s opinion overturning race-based admissions programs. She also sided with the Court’s 6-3 majority ruling Colorado couldn’t force a Christian website designer to use her talents and services to promote a “same-sex wedding.” Justice Barrett agreed with the Court’s decision that former President Biden’s plan to unilaterally cancel $430 billion in student loan debt was illegal.
Last year, Justice Barrett joined the Court’s 6-3 opinion in U.S. v. Skrmetti, allowing states to enact laws banning “trans” medical interventions for minors.
This year, Justice Barrett aligned with the Court’s decision to protect parental rights and end schools’ efforts to “transition” children without their parents’ knowledge or consent. She joined the Court’s decision to protect the right of Christian counselors to help clients with unwanted same-sex attraction or sexual identity confusion. And she joined the Court’s 6-3 decision allowing states to separate women’s and girls’ sports teams by biological sex.
Barrett is a “liberal justice”? I’m skeptical. It goes without saying Justice Barrett’s record is extremely different from Justice Jackson’s.
Furthermore, the claim that the worst Supreme Court justices in history have all been women — setting aside the obvious sexism of the argument — is, as a matter of fact and history, wrong. Here’s a short list of much worse (male) justices: Roger Taney (Dred Scott, anyone?), James Clark McReynolds, William O. Douglas, Hugo Black, Harry Blackmun, John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Anthony Kennedy and Stephen Breyer.
As Andrew T. Walker writes, “Disagree with Justice Barrett’s jurisprudence all you want — that’s your prerogative. But discrediting her reasoning by appeal to her sex or her status as an adoptive mother — as some on the populist right now do — is a category error.”
For those of us on the Right, it’s well within bounds to be frustrated with the Court’s Barbara decision. It has massive consequences for our country, for future elections, and for what it means — or doesn’t mean — to be an American citizen.
Sometimes, good justices make very bad decisions. Originalist superhero Antonin Scalia wrote the opinion in Employment Division v. Smith — a bad opinion that Justices Alito, Thomas and Gorsuch want to overturn as a “severe holding” that is “fundamentally wrong” and “ripe for reexamination.”
Justice Barrett may be seriously wrong in Barbara. But singling out one decision, saying things detached from reality, and ignoring the rest of her jurisprudence, is a mistake.
Zachary Mettler is a staff writer and communications liaison for The Daily Citizen at Focus on the Family. In his role, he writes about current political issues, U.S. history, political philosophy, and culture. Mettler has been featured in The Daily Signal, Life News, The Colorado Independent, and The Millennial Review. In his free time, he enjoys reading, running, hiking, backpacking, and walking his dog. Find his writing at: https://dailycitizen.focusonthefamily.com