The sharply conservative Supreme Court that President Donald Trump’s three appointees remade is the first since at least the 1950s to reject civil rights claims in a majority of cases involving women and minorities, according to a detailed analysis conducted for The Washington Post.
The shift brings to an end a streak of successive courts expanding such protections that began with the dawn of the civil rights era. But the historic nature of the current court is also evident in other key areas of the law over the five terms since the third of Trump’s appointees joined the bench.
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The analysis examined 270 decisions handed down by the Supreme Court between 2020 and 2024 — the first five terms of the six-justice conservative majority — and drew on the Supreme Court Database, a compendium of cases the professors maintain.
The professors compared that data to the body of rulings under Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. before 2020, as well as rulings handed down under the six other chief justices dating back to the New Deal era. The analysis did not include rulings from the current term or orders in cases on the court’s emergency docket.
Overall, the Supreme Court has consistently leaned to the right for 50 years. {snip}
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One of the most notable findings of the data analysis was the court’s shift on civil rights, Epstein and Nelson said. Since the three Trump appointees joined the court, the share of cases won by the side advocating an expansion of civil rights fell to 44 percent.
In all the other time periods going back to the early 1950s, the Supreme Court issued rulings in favor of expanding civil rights in a majority of such cases. The high-water mark for rulings in favor of civil rights was 74 percent during the court of Earl Warren in the 1950s and 1960s.
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In recent terms, a number of the civil rights cases before the court have involved protections for gay and transgender people, and in most cases, the court has ruled against them. {snip}
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But the justices have also pared back civil rights in other areas, most notably in striking down affirmative action in college admissions.
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Trump’s overwhelming series of victories on the emergency docket this term — roughly 75 percent since he took office — have intensified the debate over whether the justices are acting in a partisan manner. Democrats and liberal justices have said the orders in those cases display political bias toward the president.
The temporary rulings have allowed Trump to ban transgender soldiers from the military, strip deportation protections from migrants, fire the heads of independent agencies and gut the Education Department while legal challenges play out.
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One of the most striking findings of the data analysis is the degree to which the court has allowed religion to push into public life. Over the past five terms, the justices have voted in favor of parties asserting religious rights 98 percent of the time, far outstripping any other court in roughly 75 years.
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The court in the Trump era has weakened the landmark Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination. It appears likely the court will deliver a blow this term to the law’s last major pillar, Section 2, which directs states to draw districts to protect the voting power of minorities.
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The post Supreme Court Remade by Trump Ushers in Historic Defeats for Civil Rights appeared first on American Renaissance.
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