Democrats faced outcry on social media on Sunday for "putting a target" on Supreme Court justices after Representative Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat, said that Justice Clarence Thomas should recuse himself from cases involving former President Donald Trump's 2024 primary ballot access.
Trump, the frontrunner in the 2024 GOP presidential primary, was recently kicked off the primary ballot in Colorado and Maine. The Colorado Supreme Court banned Trump from the ballot on December 19, ruling that he was barred from holding federal office under the 14th Amendment because his actions surrounding the U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, 2021, constituted as engaging in an insurrection. On Thursday, Maine Democratic Secretary of State Shenna Bellows also ruled that Trump would be banned from the ballot using the same justification.
The former president has maintained that he did not engage in an insurrection during the Capitol riot. His campaign has also decried the decisions in Colorado and Maine and said it would fight them. Meanwhile, the Colorado Republican Party asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate Trump, arguing in a 34-page petition that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment does not apply to the office of the president.
Raskin, a former constitutional law professor, appeared on CNN's State of the Union on Sunday when host Dana Bash asked him if any of the Supreme Court justices should recuse themselves if they were to take on the case.
"Finally, the Supreme Court has developed what they are describing as a code of ethics ...But I think anybody looking at this in any kind of dispassionate reasonable way would say, if your wife was involved in the Big Lie in claiming that Donald Trump could have actually won the presidential election and had been agitating for that and participating in the events leading up to January 6 that you shouldn't be participating—" the congressman responded.
Bash interrupted: "So, he should recuse himself?
"Oh, he absolutely should recuse himself. The question is what do we do if he doesn't recuse himself," Raskin replied.
Raskin was referring to Justice Clarence Thomas, whose wife, Virginia "Ginni" Thomas came under fire for her actions surrounding the riot. Ginni, a conservative activist and Trump ally, believed along with other Trump supporters, in the former president's "Big Lie" that claimed the 2020 election was stolen from the former president by Joe Biden and the Democrats via widespread voter fraud. There is no evidence to suggest the 2020 election was rigged.
Newsweek reached out to Raskin's office via email and the Supreme Court via online form for comment.
Social media users on X, formerly Twitter, pointed a finger at Raskin's comments on Sunday, with one claiming that the Democratic congressman has potentially endangered Thomas.
X user John Hasson wrote: "Chuck Schumer put a target on Justice Kavanaugh's back prior to the Dobbs ruling and then someone tried to assassinate Kavanaugh. Now Jamie Raskin is putting a target on Justice Thomas's back..."
In June 2022, Nicholas Roske, a 26-year-old man from California, was indicted for allegedly attempting to assassinate Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Roske pleaded not guilty to all charges. According to an FBI affidavit, Roske was angry over the leaked draft of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and the Robb Elementary School shooting in Uvalde, Texas.
Following Roske's arrest, a video of Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer telling Kavanaugh that he would "pay the price" for voting against the Dobb's decision resurfaced.
RNC Research, an X account managed by the Republican National Committee, called Raskin's comments "delusional."
Steve Guest, Senator Ted Cruz's former communications adviser, wrote: "The ball game folks: Dems want to destroy the Supreme Court."
Raskin was the lead impeachment manager for the second impeachment of Trump. Trump was impeached for the second time on January 13, 2021, days after the Capitol riot for incitement of insurrection. He was later acquitted by the Senate.
Ginni Thomas' Text Messages With Mark Meadows
In March 2022, Ginni Thomas made headlines for text messages between her and Trump's former chief of staff Mark Meadows.
In the text message exchange, which was obtained by the House select committee investigating the riot, Ginni Thomas told Meadows he should encourage Trump not to concede to Biden.
"Help This Great President stand firm, Mark!!!...The majority knows Biden and the Left is attempting the greatest Heist of our History," she reportedly wrote to Meadows on November 10, 2020.
Ginni Thomas told the committee in September 2022 that her husband "was completely unaware" of her text message exchange with Meadows "until this Committee leaked them to the press."
"Regarding the 2020 election, I did not speak with him at all about the details of my volunteer campaign activities. And I did not speak with him at all about the details of my post-election activities, which were minimal, in any event," she said in her statement to the committee. "I am certain I never spoke with him about any of the legal challenges to the 2020 election, as I was not involved with those challenges in any way."
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Rachel Dobkin is a Newsweek reporter based in New York. Her focus is reporting on politics. Rachel joined Newsweek in ... Read more
