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Unrepresentative Policy of the Week:SCOTUS Shows Its True Colors: Pro-Corporate, Not Pro-People

For a little while, it looked as if the new Robert’s court, despite its deep conservative 6-3 tilt, wouldn’t be as bad as all of us feared. After all, they handed out several narrow rulings protecting the ACA, declining to hear anti-trans bills, and protecting free speech to name a few. Perhaps the court isn’t so conservative and dangerous after all.

Chief Justice Roberts, is a savvy operator, and he is aware that the court’s reputation is in peril. Ruling directly against these hot button social issues like health care and abortion rights would only further exacerbate the situation, and could eventually lead to court expansion, in a world with stronger Democrats. And so SCOTUS gives the people some minor wins, and lulls them into a sense of security.

The mistake here, is to think that the primary motive of the conservative judiciary is a social agenda: “guns, god and abortion.” While this is certainly important, both to the base, and an increasing number of justices, this social agenda is only a secondary goal. The true north star of the right wing project is pro-business/pro-corporate power.

This was on full display with two recent rulings:

1. SCOTUS ruled in a shameful 8-1 decision, that trafficked child slaves did not have standing to sue Nestle under the Alien Tort Act.

2. SCOTUS ruled 6-3, along partisan lines, against union reps trying to organize farm laborers. The key decision hinged on deciding that requiring farm owners to allow union reps access to their land was an unconstitutional seizure of private property.

Unlike the above social rulings, these decisions by the court were broad and far reaching. The expansion of corporate power both internationally and within our borders continues unabated under this court, no matter how reasonable they try to appear.

The American people, of course, think that corporations already have far too much power:

How do you feel about the size and influence of major corporations:

Satisfied: 26%

Dissatisfied: 73%

The SCOTUS is completely out of step with the American people, and this is only going to get worse as time goes on. As long as the true power in this country lies with concentrated private power, unaccountable to the people, our politics from the legislature to the court room, cannot represent the people. We are far behind the eight ball in the judicial fight, and it will be a long slog back, but we need to be organizing, and growing not just our political voices, but our economic power. Only then will we speak the language of donor class, and the political system that serves them. So join us, as we build an economic cudgel each Tuesday, until we free our courts from the pro-corporate scourge!

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