WASHINGTON — Liberal Justice Elena Kagan on Tuesday sharply criticized the Supreme Court’s conservative majority, saying it undermined democracy in a series of rulings, including several that have prompted a new wave of legislative map-drawing that has increasingly eliminated competitive districts.
Kagan, who has dissented in those cases, also took aim at the majority for striking down campaign finance restrictions and, as she put it, the “evisceration” of the landmark 1965 Voting Rights Act that was enacted to protect minority voters.
“Part of the reason why the court got it wrong was a kind of lack of the appropriate concern or understanding of the consequences of their decisions,” she said in remarks at Catholic University’s law school in Washington, D.C.
“I do think in all these areas the court has blinded itself to the very deleterious effects of their rulings on how the political system works and has created a democracy that doesn’t work as well as it should,” she added.
Kagan was referring in particular to the 2019 ruling that said federal courts could not intervene to limit extreme partisan gerrymandering. She also mentioned a series of rulings that have gutted the Voting Rights Act, including one this year that led to Republican states eliminating majority Black districts. The court has also consistently struck down campaign finance restrictions, the most recent in June.
Heading into the Nov. 3 midterm elections, several states have redrawn their congressional maps to maximize the number of seats the majority party can win in that state. Texas kicked things off, at President Donald Trump’s urging, followed by other states, including California.
The 2019 redistricting ruling has been particularly harmful, Kagan said. As a result, “both parties have been engaged in a race to the bottom in terms of doing these partisan gerrymanders.”
The lopsided maps deny people “their rights to voting equality” and have the effect of “driving people away from the center, towards the wings, toward the extremes” because candidates only have to worry about winning the primary, she added.
The failure of the court to take action on the issue is “making what I think is unfortunately a too polarized country even more so,” Kagan said.
When states draw legislative districts that almost wipe out the ability of many voters to elect their chosen candidate, it is “very destructive of our democracy,” she added.
As for the increasingly unlimited amounts of money in politics, Kagan said that many voters find it disconcerting.
“I think you know the people of America look around this political system and think that all this money, chasing all these political candidates, is a nightmare, and they’re right,” she said.
During the question-and-answer session with professor Joel Alicea, Kagan was also critical of the Supreme Court’s ruling this year that gave Trump greater control over hitherto independent federal agencies that were set up by Congress to be free from political interference.
She questioned the wisdom of giving the president too much power, saying there is a “danger of one president being able to ride roughshod over all the other institutions of government and over the people.”
But Kagan also defended the court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, over claims from the left that it is a rubber stamp for Trump. She cited several rulings in which the president lost, including his attempt to impose sweeping tariffs.
The court is “deeply conservative,” she said, but in certain cases “definitely pushed back on the president.”