Paxton warns against politicization of Supreme Court, 'I will not stand for this obvious power grab from the Biden administration'

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton recently joined 10 other state attorneys general in issuing a warning to the administration of President Joe Biden and Congress regarding any effort to expand the U.S. Supreme Court.

Paxton took to Twitter to expound on the letter that 11 state attorneys general sent to both the White House and congressional leaders.

“I will not stand for this obvious power grab from the Biden administration,” Paxton said in his Tweet. “The Supreme Court has a robust history of keeping in line with the laws of the nation – not the whim of political objectives.”

The letter comes as Biden issued an executive order to form a committee tasked with providing Biden with a report on current and past debate surrounding “reform” of the Supreme Court and analysis of those arguments. At the same time, the U.S. House of Representatives is considering adding three more justices to the court with House Resolution 2584.

“Given the filing of the bill six days after the president announced his Executive Order regarding the Supreme Court, it is clear that the Commission on the Supreme Court is nothing [but] a coordinated attempt to justify a naked political power grab by the leaders of Congress and the president,” the letter from the attorneys general states. “We believe that such actions will seriously undermine our constitutional system, the public’s confidence in our courts, and the rule of law.”

The letter further asserts that the signatories consider the current members of the court to be independent and that while the signatories have not always agreed with some of the opinions they have espoused, they consider those disagreements a matter of legal philosophy rather than political philosophy.

“The Justices of the Supreme Court have repeatedly shown their independence, despite the difference and the labels some have put on them,” the letter states. “When elected officials do not like the outcome in a case, that is not a sign of the politicization of the Court, but of the system working. After all, the whims of elected officials are the very thing against which the Court is there to protect the people.”

HR 2584 is currently under consideration by the House Committee on the Judiciary.