C.J. Roberts Immediately Smacks Down Trump’s All-Cap Judicial Impeachment Cry

** This column required an almost immediate update to include Chief Justice Robert’s nearly unprecedented immediate response to a Trump tweet earlier today:

President Donald Trump is once again acting as his own worst enemy. Without a doubt, the world could so easily be his oyster – president during a time of Republican control of Congress and with a Supreme Court that is more than amenable to conservative causes. Yet time after time he manages to bring things to the point where there is an almost inevitable pushback from otherwise sympathetic entities. Of late we see the Trump administration pushing the limits of even immigration powers by invoking a 1789 statute (That would be the first year of the Constitutional Republic), one that has only been used in a time of war, in the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan gang members. The order was so out of the ordinary and so sweeping that a highly experienced DC District Court judge had serious questions and ordered the whole process stopped – only to find the matter complete with the plane in the air and refusing to turn around. Now Trump is demanding that Chief Judge James Boarsberg be impeached after a contentious hearing yesterday in which the judge demanded answers – with Trump’s call coming in an all-caps tweet sure to get the attention of the Supreme Court.

Few things bother the judiciary – and especially the SCOTUS, more than constantly referencing the president who appointed a judge, but ignoring court orders would be one that is even more threatening. In this matter, the Trump administration has brought both concerns into play, along with the presidential call to impeach Boarsberg. Today, Trump lashed out in a manner that will reverberate in the high court across from Congress:

This Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator who was sadly appointed by Barack Hussein Obama, was not elected President – He didn’t WIN the popular VOTE (by a lot!), he didn’t WIN ALL SEVEN SWING STATES, he didn’t WIN 2,750 to 525 Counties, HE DIDN’T WIN ANYTHING!

This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED!!!

WE DON’T WANT VICIOUS, VIOLENT, AND DEMENTED CRIMINALS, MANY OF THEM DERANGED MURDERERS, IN OUR COUNTRY. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!!!

Trump is calling for James Boasberg, the federal judge questioning why the administration failed to follow his order halting some deportations, to be impeached.But can Trump impeach judges? The short answer: No. Only Congress can: www.democracydocket.com/analysis/elo…

— Democracy Docket (@democracydocket.com) 2025-03-18T14:04:42.790Z

Update:

BREAKING: Chief Justice John Roberts responds to inquires after Trump called for a D.C. federal judge who ruled against him to be impeached @CourthouseNews pic.twitter.com/Fv6ZP0dbGq

— Kelsey Reichmann (@KelseyReichmann) March 18, 2025

BREAK: Chief Justice Roberts condemns impeachment threats of federal judges following Trump's call to impeach a D.C. federal judge. "For more than 2 centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision."

— Jimmy Hoover (@JimmyHooverDC) March 18, 2025

Well. As I have written many times, to the extent that he feels picked on, Trump need only revisit Pres’s. Biden and Obama’s administrations to see that federal district court judges will halt the entire executive branch under certain circumstances without regard to massive popular vote victories (Both Obama and Biden enjoyed electoral and popular vote victories similar or greater than Trump’s). None of this is unusual, and – to the extent it matters, even if the judge slows the Trump administration down in this proceeding, and even if the court tosses out the use of the Alien Enemies Act altogether, the administration can still likely deport legitimate Venezuelan gang members – or at least imprison them. Unlike Obama and Biden administration programs for DACA and higher-ed loans, the Trump administration will almost surely get what it wants. But Trump’s call to impeach the judge, along with concerns that the order was ignored, nearly compel the SCOTUS to step in.

Instead of having the Supreme Court look favorably on extreme – but well-planned, immigration policy within the context of traditional enforcement, Trump is forcing the SCOTUS to examine the matter in light of whether they consider their orders as sacrosanct. It is not like they have an alternative. The SCUTUS is not going to rule that a district court can be ignored but they must be followed. Unless they back up judicial orders at all levels they’re left to having to come up with a reason to show up the next morning. This is all simplified but the point remains.

Nor will the SCOTUS ignore the fact that this order didn’t come down from some radical, inexperienced, judge from the hinterland after having been forum-shopped (Which has happened more than once in conservative cases). No, Boarsberg is the chief judge of the powerful DC Circuit and the former head of the FISC court – the one overseeing foreign surveillance, it would be difficult to find a more experienced jurist in this area. The call to impeach the judge will go nowhere in the end – he won’t be removed, not by the Senate, anyway, but the “call” within the tweet will get noticed and likely will garner greater consequences. Thus it is that once again, Trump’s seeming need to lash out eventually serves no purpose except to threaten what he actually wants to do. He is all but forcing the SCOTUS into a situation where it either backs up Article III judges, or sends the country reeling into an area that even some of Trump’s most hardened supporters don’t want visited.

It is tempting to say that all of this was so predictable – anyone conversant in Project 2025 had reason to fear all of this. But it’s hard to imagine that a majority of the voters really signed up for this. They likely envisioned “Trump Classic” – whereby they would put up with radical tweets lashing out against the media in order to get tax cuts, strict border enforcement, and a decent economy (The basic expectations from the voters). Weirdly, Trump could likely have gotten more by simply using the mechanisms in place and not forcing the courts and Congress to guardedly keep control of their powers. The lack of a “war” in the invocation of the statute was enough to ensure that all of this came to a halt while awaiting an explanation anyway. Everything else is just… Well. Here we are.

Watch for the SCOTUS to step in sooner rather than later. It is hard to imagine that they want this kind of pressure on the courts to go on much longer. If Trump wants to force a showdown, they are likely to give it to him now – or just start summer early.

God Bless: I can be reached at [email protected] and on twitter-X at @JasonMiciak, and please follow me now on Bluesky. 

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