Senate Judiciary panel advances Supreme Court ethics reform bill  

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted along party lines after a more-than-three-hour markup Thursday to advance a Supreme Court ethics reform bill in the wake of media reports that conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito accepted tens of thousands of dollars’ worth of gifts and perks from wealthy Republican donors.  

The committee voted 11 to 10 to approve the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal and Transparency Act, which would require justices to adopt a code of conduct and create a transparent process for members of the public to submit ethics complaints against members of the court.  

Every Democratic member of the committee voted for the reforms while every Republican voted no. 

The bill would also require the Supreme Court to adopt disclosure rules for gifts, travel and income received by justices and law clerks that are as rigorous as Senate and House disclosure rules. 

It would establish a panel of chief judges from the lower courts to investigate and make recommendations in response to complaints and require greater disclosure of funding behind amicus curiae briefs to the court.  

Senate Republicans filed 61 amendments to the legislation to drag out the Judiciary Committee’s markup for several hours. The panel ended up voting on fewer than a dozen of them. 

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), the ranking member of the panel, accused Democrats of trying to “destroy” the court in retaliation for recent landmark decisions by the court’s conservative majority to overturn the constitutional right to abortion, to reject the affirmative action policies at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina and invalidate President Biden’s student loan relief program.  

“What you’re trying to do is not improve the court, you’re trying to destroy it as it exists,” he told his Democratic colleagues on the panel.  

“You have to look at this in terms of what’s been going on for a couple years,” he said, pointing to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) warning to conservative Supreme Court justices in a rally held outside the court in March of 2020 that they would “pay the price” for ruling in favor of abortion restrictions. 

Schumer later clarified that he never intended to suggest anything other than political and public opinion consequences for the Supreme Court if it restricted abortion rights. 

Graham also accused Democrats of wanting to expand the Supreme Court to dilute the influence of conservative justices.  

“You have done just about everything there is to do to delegitimize this court,” he said. “Members of the Democratic leadership went to the steps of the Supreme Court and literally threatened people.” 

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) rejected that accusation.  

“Some have suggested that Democrats are pursuing Supreme Court ethics reform to target the court’s current right-wing majority. Far from it. The reforms we are proposing would apply in equal force to all justices,” he said.  

Durbin noted that he first urged Chief Justice John Roberts 11 years ago, when the composition of the court was much different, to adopt a binding code of conduct. 

“Unfortunately, he did not accept my suggestion. Since then as more and more stories have emerged of justices’ ethical lapses, the American people’s confidence in the Supreme Court has dropped to an all-time low,” Durbin said.  

ProPublica reported in April that Thomas accepted gifts of private plane travel and luxury vacations from Republican megadonor Harlan Crow over two decades without disclosing them publicly.  


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The outlet also reported that Thomas didn’t disclose that one of Crow’s companies bought a property in Savannah, Ga., where Thomas’s mother lives and in which the justice owned a third interest. 

Another ProPublica report revealed that Crow paid for the private school tuition for Thomas’s teenage grandnephew, whom Thomas said he was raising “as a son.”  

ProPublica reported last month that Alito accepted a vacation at a luxury fishing lodge in Alaska in 2008 paid for by conservative donors and didn’t disclose it publicly.  

Alito traveled to the lodge aboard a private jet owned by hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer and six years later ruled in a case, Republic of Argentina v. NML Capital, that resulted in Singer’s hedge fund recouping a $2.4 billion payout. 

Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), a member of the panel, argued Thursday that Thomas’s wife, Ginni, a conservative activist, accepted payments from groups with business before the court that were not properly disclosed. 

“How is it that you can have a Supreme Court justice who does not recuse himself when his wife is involved in the very issue that is before him?” she said. “Those kinds of examples really raise the question of why the Supreme Court shouldn’t have a code of ethics.” 

More recently, liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor came under criticism after The Associated Press reported that the her staff pushed colleges and a library to purchase copies of her book when she was scheduled to speak at their sponsored events. 

Democrats voted along party lines to defeat Republican amendments to the bill, including one sponsored by Graham to empower the Supreme Court’s police force to investigate threats to justices and another by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) to allow judges to carry guns for self-protection without restriction by state and local laws.  

Durbin argued that the Department of Justice and FBI already has the job of investigating threats against justices and voiced concerns that expanding the mission of the Supreme Court’s relatively small police force would overtax it and require additional resources.  

Durbin and other Democrats argued that Cornyn’s gun proposal wasn’t relevant to Supreme Court ethics reform. Cornyn argued that arming justices would protect them from potential attackers motivated by criticism of their decisions and ideology.  

Democrats also defeated an amendment sponsored by Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) to delay the implementation of the Supreme Court ethics reform bill until Congress learns who leaked a draft of the court’s opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned the constitutional right to an abortion.  

Durbin said Blackburn’s proposal wouldn’t do anything to address the “crisis of confidence” in the court. 

The committee adopted an amendment sponsored by Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) to condemn denigrating rhetoric used against Thomas or any justice. Republicans who supported the amendment cited several examples of Democratic officials using such rhetoric to criticize Thomas.  

—Updated at 4:50 p.m.

McConnell declines to say whether Trump should be charged criminally for Jan. 6 

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who condemned former President Trump two years ago for inciting the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, declined Wednesday to say whether Trump should now be criminally charged for those actions

McConnell, asked about a possible indictment of Trump, stated that he does not plan to “critique” GOP candidates for president.  

“I’ve said every week out here that I’m not going to comment on the various candidates for the presidency. How I felt about that I expressed at the time, but I’m not going to start getting into sort of critiquing the various candidates for president,” McConnell told reporters when asked whether it would be legitimate for the Justice Department to charge Trump in connection with efforts to stop Congress’s certification of President Biden’s 2020 election victory.  

Minority Leader Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) addresses reporters after the weekly policy luncheon on Wednesday, July 19, 2023. (Greg Nash)

Trump announced Tuesday that special counsel Jack Smith had informed him in a letter that he is the target of a grand jury investigation related to Jan. 6. 

The target letter cites three statutes that Trump may be charged under, including the deprivation of rights, conspiracy to commit an offense against or defraud the United States and tampering with a witness, according to news outlets.  

McConnell excoriated Trump on the Senate floor in February 2021 at the conclusion of his second impeachment trial for provoking a mob of supporters to march to the U.S. Capitol and overrun its security to stop the certification of the 2020 election.  

“There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day. The people who stormed this building believed they were acting on the wishes and instructions of their president,” McConnell said.  


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More than 1,060 people have been charged by federal prosecutors because of their actions that day, and more than 600 people have pleaded guilty, according to a database compiled by National Public Radio.  

More than 80 people have been convicted on all charges, while only two people have been acquitted on all charges. 

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Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) said Tuesday that being “practically and morally responsible” didn’t necessarily warrant criminal charges and that prosecutors would have to hew closely to the law and facts of the case.  

“Practically and morally is something very different than legally, and I think that’s what the Justice Department has to look at. They’ve got to look at the law, the facts as they’ve interviewed people, and then make a determination about whether laws were broken,” he said.    

GOP senators hold back on defending Trump as he faces new indictment 

The revelation that former President Trump faces a possible grand jury indictment connected to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack and his efforts to hold on to power has landed like a bombshell on Capitol Hill, where lawmakers saw firsthand the violence unleashed that day. 

Some GOP lawmakers rushed to Trump’s defense, but many Republicans in the Senate held back from defending the former president, who has been accused of stoking the Jan. 6 mob and who waited before calling on protesters to disperse.  

The expected indictment separately poses a tough political problem for many Republicans critical of Trump, who remains wildly popular with the party’s base. 

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.), who hasn’t spoken to Trump since December 2020, stayed quiet about the news of yet another indictment against his onetime ally, who is now leading the Republican presidential primary field by 30 points in national polls.  

Minority Leader Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) addresses reporters after the weekly policy luncheon on Wednesday, July 19, 2023. (Greg Nash)

His top deputies, Senate Republican Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), reacted with caution.

Asked whether it would be “legitimate” for special counsel Jack Smith to charge Trump for trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election, Thune said it would depend on the facts and evidence presented.  

“That’s going to depend on whether or not laws were broken," he said. "So clearly, I don’t know what they’re looking at. But I’m sure we’ll know in due time.” 

Cornyn dodged the politically charged topic altogether, arguing the Justice Department has the authority to investigate whether Trump broke the laws in trying to stop the certification of the 2020 election. 

“I think that’s entirely within the purview of the Department of Justice and has nothing to do with the United States Senate,” he said.  

Asked if Smith is a “credible prosecutor,” he said, “I have no knowledge of anything approaching that.” 

Senate Republican Conference Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), who called the indictment of Trump last month for violating the Espionage Act “political” and “rotten,” was the only senior member of the Republican leadership to accuse the Justice Department of acting on political motives.  

“It looks like the president is targeting his most popular opponent. Isn't that interesting? Sounds political to me,” he said.  

Asked if he saw any qualitative difference between the 37 felony counts federal prosecutors brought against Trump last month for refusing to turn over classified documents he kept improperly at Mar-a-Lago and new charges related to Jan. 6, Barrasso saw both indictments as political attacks.  


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“The administration is siccing its dogs on the former president of the United States and their most formidable opponent,” he said.  

Senate Republican Conference Vice Chairwoman Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) only said, “It’s a never-ending story, that’s my comment.”  

The generally muted response from Senate Republican leaders posed a stark contrast with House Republican leaders, who rushed to Trump’s defense.  

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) suggested the Justice Department is bringing new charges against Trump because he is leading the Republican presidential field by double digits and pulled ahead of President Biden in a recent poll.  

“Recently, President Trump went up in the polls and was actually surpassing President Biden for reelection. So what do they do now? Weaponize government to go after their No. 1 opponent,” McCarthy said Tuesday. 

“This is not equal justice. They treat people differently and they go after their adversaries,” he said. 

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) speaks to reporters during a media availability in Statuary Hall of the Capitol on Wednesday, July 19, 2023.

McCarthy’s comments reveal how his views of Trump’s culpability for the attack on the Capitol have evolved since January 2021, when he told GOP colleagues that Trump “bears responsibility for his words and actions ­— no if, ands or buts.” 

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) accused the Justice Department of waging a politically motivated prosecution to distract from a whistleblower’s claims that senior administration officials interfered with an Internal Revenue Service investigation of Hunter Biden.

“Now you see the Biden administration going after President Trump once again, and it begs that question, ‘Is there a double standard? Is justice being administered equally?’” Scalise asked at a press conference.  

Other Trump allies in the House joined the attack against the administration.  

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) claimed Biden’s Justice Department did little to prosecute Black Lives Matter protesters who breached a federal courthouse in 2020 or to prosecute threats against conservative Supreme Court justices. 

“But if you’re President Trump and do nothing wrong? PROSECUTE. Americans are tired of the double standard!” he tweeted.  

Another Trump ally, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), attacked Smith on Twitter as a “lousy attorney” and pointed to the Supreme Court overturning his conviction of former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R). 

“He only targets Republicans because he’s a weak little bitch for the Democrats,” she tweeted. 

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio)

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) asks a question during a hearing on Wednesday, June 21, 2023 to discuss the report from Special Counsel John Durham about the “Crossfire Hurricane” probe into allegations of contacts between Russia and former President Trump’s 2016 campaign.

Senate Republicans, many of whom have made clear they don’t want to see Trump as the party’s nominee for president in 2024, however, broke with their House GOP colleagues over the claim that the Justice Department is operating a “two-tier” system and holding Trump to a special standard. 

“I think you’ve got to go where the facts lead you and determine whether or not laws are broken. But there shouldn’t be two systems of justice; everybody should be held accountable and there ought to be equal justice under the law,” Thune told reporters. 

“Clearly in these circumstances, it’s a politically charged environment. I think it puts an even higher burden of proof on the Justice Department given the perceptions that people have about that but this has got to be driven by the law and the facts,” he said.  

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) addresses reporters after the weekly policy luncheon on Wednesday, July 19, 2023.

McConnell excoriated Trump on the Senate floor at the end of his 2021 impeachment trial for inciting the mob that stormed the Capitol hallways and ransacked the Senate parliamentarian’s office. 

“There is no question that President Trump is practically and morally responsible for provoking the events of that day,” he declared, referring to the violence and chaos that resulted in injuries to more than 100 Capitol police officers.  

One officer, Brian Sicknick, died of natural causes while defending the Capitol.  

Thune said just because the Senate Republicans’ top leader called Trump “practically and morally” responsible, that did not necessarily warrant criminal charges.  

“Practically and morally is something very different than legally, and I think that’s what the Justice Department has to look at. They’ve got to look at the law, the facts as they’ve interviewed people, and then make a determination about whether laws were broken,” he said.   

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Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), who voted twice to convict Trump on impeachment charges — including on the charge of inciting the Jan. 6 riot — warned his House GOP colleagues about relentlessly attacking the Justice Department.

He voiced concern about "the diminution of institutions in which we rely as a society." 

"A democracy works when we have confidence in the justice system, in the legal system, in our prosecutors and so forth. If we constantly attack and diminish them, that weakens the democracy," he said. 

GOP senators rattled by radical conservative populism

Republican senators say they’re worried that conservative populism, though always a part of the GOP, is beginning to take over the party, becoming more radical and threatening to cause them significant political problems heading into the 2024 election.  

GOP senators are saying they’re being increasingly confronted by constituents who buy into discredited conspiracy theories such as the claim that Democrats stole the 2020 presidential election or that federal agents incited the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.  

Growing distrust with government institutions, from the FBI, CIA and Department of Justice to the Centers for Disease Control and National Institutes of Health, make it more difficult for Republican lawmakers to govern. 

Republican senators believe their party has a good chance to take back control of the White House and Senate, given President Biden’s low approval ratings and the favorable map of Senate seats up for reelection, but they regularly face political headaches caused by populist members of their party who say the rest of the GOP is out of step with mainstream America. 

“We should be concerned about this as Republicans. I’m having more ‘rational Republicans’ coming up to me and saying, ‘I just don’t know how long I can stay in this party,’” said Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska). “Now our party is becoming known as a group of kind of extremist, populist over-the-top [people] where no one is taking us seriously anymore. 

FILE - Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, asks a question during a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)

“You have people who felt some allegiance to the party that are now really questioning, ‘Why am I [in the party?]” she added. “I think it’s going to get even more interesting as we move closer to the elections and we start going through some of these primary debates. 

“Is it going to be a situation of who can be more outlandish than the other?” she asked.  

Some Senate Republicans worry the populist winds are downgrading their chances of picking up seats in 2024.

“There are an astonishing number of people in my state who believe the election was stolen,” said one Republican senator who requested anonymity to talk about the growing popularity of conservative conspiracy theories at home.  

As an example, some Republicans point to Arizona, where Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.), an independent who left the Democratic Party last year, is up for reelection.

Sinema is likely to face a challenge from the left in the likely Democratic nominee Rep. Ruben Gallego (Ariz.) as well as a GOP nominee. If that nominee is former TV anchor Kari Lake, who has embraced conspiracy theories about elections and lost a gubernatorial race last year, many in the GOP think they’re in trouble.

One senior Senate Republican strategist, assessing the race, lamented that “the Republican Party in Arizona is a mess.” 

Republican senators say they are alarmed at how many Republicans, including those with higher levels of education and income, buy the unsubstantiated claims that the last presidential election was stolen.  

A second Republican senator who spoke with The Hill said the growing strength of radical populism “makes it a lot more difficult to govern, it makes it difficult to talk to constituents.” 

“There are people who surprise me — I’m surprised they have those views. It’s amazing to me the number of people, the kind of people who think the election was stolen,” the lawmaker said. “I don’t want to use this word but it’s not just a ‘red-neck’ thing. It’s people in business, the president of a bank, a doctor.”  

The lawmaker, who requested anonymity to discuss the political challenge posted by surging conservative populism, accused some fellow Republicans of trying to exploit voter discontent to gain local or national prominence.  

“In my state there are a lot of folks who see Washington as disconnected, they see their way of life threatened. There’s something that generates discontent that elected officials take advantage of,” the senator said.  

Tuberville’s controversies

Some of the biggest populist-linked headaches recently have come from Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R), a staunch ally of former President Trump who is now holding up more than 260 nonpolitical military promotions to protest the Defense Department’s abortion policy.  

Tuberville caused an uproar early last week by defending the idea of letting white nationalists serve in the military and disputing the idea that white nationalism is an inherently racist ideology.  

Tuberville later reversed himself after Senate Republican colleagues ranging from Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) forcefully denounced white supremacy and white nationalism.  

GOP senators also have to regularly distance themselves from the radical proposals of populist conservatives in the House, such as House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who earlier this year proposed cutting Department of Justice and FBI funding in response to federal investigations of Trump.   


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Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) pushed back on calls to defund the Justice Department, telling reporters: “Are we going to get rid of the Justice Department? No. I think defunding is a really bad idea.” 

Thune later explained to The Hill: “There are seasons, swings back and forth in politics and we’re in one now where the dominant political thinking is more populist with respect to national security, foreign policy, some domestic issues.” 

But he said “that stuff comes and goes and it’s built around personalities,” alluding to the broadly held view that Trump’s election to the presidency in 2016 and his lasting influence over the party has put his brand of populism at the forefront.  

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), an advisor to the Senate Republican leadership, said bread-and-butter conservative economic ideas still resonated with voters, but he acknowledged “the cable news shows” continue to keep attention on themes that Trump likes to emphasize, such as election fraud and the “deep-state” control of the federal government.  

“So there are some people paying attention to that but most people are trying to just get on with their lives,” he said. “There’s a lot of distrust of Washington, and who can blame people.” 

“It concerns me that people lose faith in their institutions, but this has been a long story throughout our history. It’s nothing new although it’s troubling,” he said. 

Waving off impeachment

Senate Republicans tried to wave off their House colleagues from advancing articles of impeachment authored by Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) against President Biden and rolled their eyes at Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R-Ga.) attempt to expunge Trump’s impeachment record.  

Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) warned, “I fear that snap impeachments will become the norm, and they mustn't.” 

Asked about efforts to erase Trump’s impeachment record, Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) quoted the popular show “Succession”: “Logan Roy made a good point. These are not serious people.”

Romney, who was the GOP nominee for president in 2012 before Trump took over the party four years later, last year called Greene and Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) “morons” for speaking at a white nationalist event in Florida. 

Asked this week about Tuberville’s defense of white nationalism and how it reflected on the GOP, Romney said: “Our party has lots of problems, add that to the list.”  

The party of Reagan has transformed into the party of Trump, and to the dismay of some veteran Republican lawmakers, it doesn’t look like it’s going back to what it was anytime soon.  

One ascendent young conservative leader, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who supported objecting to certifying Biden’s victory on Jan. 6, 2021, thinks the Republican Party’s embrace of populism is more than a passing fad.  

He says the new era of politics is more than a battle between Trump allies and Trump haters, or even between Republicans and Democrats. 

Speaking at the National Conservatism Conference two years ago, he declared: “We have been governed by a political consensus forged by a political class that has lost touch with what binds us together as Americans. And it has lost sight of the basic requirements of liberty.” 

“The great divide of our time is not between Trump supporters and Trump opponents, or between suburban voters and rural ones, or between Red America and Blue America,” he said. “No, the great divide of our time is between the political agenda of the leadership elite and the great and broad middle of our society. And to answer the discontent of our time, we must end that divide.”  

GOP senators want Roberts to take action on Supreme Court

Republican senators are leaning on Chief Justice John Roberts to do something about the Supreme Court's appearance problem in the wake of reports that conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito accepted luxury vacations from conservative donors.  

While Republicans don’t support Supreme Court ethics reform legislation sponsored by Democrats, they think the reports that Thomas and Alito accepted expensive vacations funded by wealthy donors has created a real public relations problem for the court. 

These lawmakers want Roberts to take the issue of legislation out of Congress’s hands by issuing a judicial code of ethics or some other updated statement of principles for he and his fellow justices.  

“I think it would be helpful for the court to up its game. I don’t want Congress to start micromanaging the court but I think confidence-building would be had if they were more clear on some of this stuff,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), the top-ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

ProPublica this week reported that Alito flew on a private plane owned by hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer to a luxury fishing lodge in Alaska in 2008.  

Alito later decided not to recuse himself from a 2014 case that pitted the Republic of Argentina against American creditors, including Singer. Singer’s hedge fund ultimately gained a $2.4 billion payout after the Supreme Court ruled 7-1 in its favor. 

Alito explained in a Wall Street Journal op-ed that he did not include the private flight to the King Salmon fishing lodge on his financial disclosure reports because he viewed it as personal hospitality exempt from disclosure requirements. 

Graham had previously called on Roberts to address criticism of the Supreme Court’s ethics policies after ProPublica reported earlier this year that Thomas had accepted luxury trips and other perks from Republican megadonor Harlan Crow over the course of two decades — none of which Thomas had included in financial disclosures.

ProPublica reported that Crow paid the tuition for Thomas’s grand-nephew at a private boarding school and that one of Crow’s companies bought a house in which Thomas had a one-third financial interest.  

Graham told The Hill in April that the court should adopt new ethical guidelines.

“A lot of us are really leery of micromanaging the other branch, but I think that’s where the court is headed. At least that’s where I hope they are,” he said at the time. 

“The reason we have these [ethics] rules on our side [of government] is to make sure people feel confident, and I think that’s where the court is headed.”   

It’s unclear if Roberts could get his fellow justices to agree on any new course of action. But it’s clearly becoming a growing concern for some Republicans.

“I think that the nine justices need to get on the same page,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), a member of the Judiciary Committee. “I believe the Article III branch should address concerns amongst themselves without congressional intervention. 

“I think it’s a process that the justices should go through and get consensus,” he added. “The chief justice can’t do it on his own.”  

Asked if he thinks the Supreme Court has a public perception problem, Tillis said, “I do.” 

“I think it’s time to show progress,” he said.  

Roberts told an audience at the American Law Institute on May 23 that he and his fellow justices are working to reassure the public that it adheres to “the highest standards of conduct.”  

“We are continuing to look at things we can do to give practical effect to that commitment. And I am confident that there are ways to do that consistent with our status as an independent branch of government and the Constitution’s separations of powers,” he said. 

Yet a month later, the court hasn’t made any new announcement about its ethical rules or procedures.  

Tillis thinks Roberts is having trouble getting all nine members of the high court to agree on how to address concerns about its conduct and adherence to ethical guidelines.

“If you had nine justices saying, 'We need to address this,' then they would be doing something. So logic tells me maybe there’s not consensus,” he said. “They need to sort it out. It’s their institution; they should preserve the integrity.”

Asked about Alito’s fishing trip, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), another Judiciary Committee member, said, "All of us need to be concerned about the public confidence in the courts, but this is not something that Congress has the authority over.” 

“This is something that the court itself needs to come to grips with. I hope that John Roberts will do that,” he said. “I understand they’re still working on a review of their ethics policy.” 

Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), a key subcommittee chairman, announced Wednesday that they will mark up Supreme Court ethics legislation after the July 4 recess, but so far only one Republican, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska), has sponsored a Supreme Court ethics reform bill.  

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) told reporters Wednesday that Congress needs to “stay out” of the court’s business.  

Brian Fallon, the executive director of Demand Justice, a progressive advocacy group that favors Supreme Court reform, said the reports of Alito and Thomas accepting lavish gifts from wealthy donors has put GOP senators in a tough spot.  

“These Republicans are caught between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, they don’t want to have to cooperate with Democrats on ethics legislation, because it sort of accepts the premise that the Republican justices are behaving corruptly and there’s a need to rein them in,” he said.  

“The second thing is this constant drip, drip, drip of scandals emanating out of the court that is causing the courts to be highly salient politically with the public is making the Republicans’ resistance to ethics legislation look even worse,” Fallon added.  

“The Republican lawmakers are sort of being dragged down with the court, because by running interference for the court on any of these ethics bills, they are attaching themselves to them and they are putting themselves in the position of having to defend every new scandal that comes out about trips that were taken by Clarence Thomas or Sam Alito,” he added. “The obvious solution in their minds is: ‘Roberts, this hot potato belongs in your lap, if you would just self-administer some improved ethics guidelines, then it would take some of the oomph out of these stories.’" 

Carrie Campbell Severino, the president of JCN, a conservative advocacy group that favors “the Founders’ vision of a nation of limited government,” disputed the view that the Supreme Court has an image problem.  

“The only image problem after ProPublica’s recent reporting is ProPublica’s own image attempting to cast completely legal and ethical behavior as somehow wrong,” she said. “Their reporting was absolutely shoddy.”  

Severino said the notion that “Justice Alito’s fishing trip … would have triggered recusal obligations is absurd.”  

“It’s even more absurd that the cases they’re talking about were decided by overwhelming majorities,” she said. “The Argentina case was not even close.” 

ProPublica reported that Severino and JCN filed an amicus brief supporting Singer’s interest in the case, Republic of Argentina v. NML Capital. 

Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.) said she agrees with GOP colleagues who want the court to address the growing criticism of its ethical standards.  

“I certainly believe it’s in the Supreme Court’s and John Roberts’s not only perusal but best interests to address this issue to the satisfaction of the public and use the standards that should apply to anyone in the executive or legislative branch with regard to ethics,” she said. 

While Supreme Court justices are subject to the Ethics in Government Act of 1978, which requires justices to file annual financial disclosure reports, they are not covered by the Code of Conduct for United States Judges, which covers all federal district and appellate courts. 

Roberts included a statement of principles in an April 25 letter to Durbin, noting that Supreme Court justices agreed in 1991 to “follow the substance” of the Judicial Conference Regulations but cautioned they “are broadly worded principles” and “not themselves rules.”  

The Judicial Conference revised its financial disclosure rules in March to specify that judges must disclose nonbusiness stays at resorts, the use of private jets and when gifts of hospitality are reimbursed by a third party.  

Murkowski has co-sponsored a bill with Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) that would require the Supreme Court to establish its own ethics code and appoint an official to review potential conflicts and public complaints.  

But so far, King, the lead sponsor, hasn’t found any other Republicans to sign on to the legislation. 

King told The Hill that he was somewhat surprised that the proposal didn’t muster more bipartisan support since it didn’t prescribe any specific ethical rules for the court. 

Senate, House Republicans on collision course over defense spending 

Senate Republicans are looking for a way to get around the caps on defense spending set by the debt limit deal that President Biden and Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) negotiated last month, putting them on a collision course with House Republicans.

Republican defense hawks on the Senate Appropriations Committee vented their frustration with the allocations for the Defense Department set by Senate Democrats and House Republicans, which represents an increase of more than 3 percent over current spending levels. 

“If you’re looking at China’s navy and you think now’s the time to shrink our Navy, you sure as hell shouldn’t be in the Navy. We go from 298 ships under this budget deal to eventually 291. ... You sunk the Navy. The Congress has sunk eight ships. How many fighter squadrons have we parked because of this deal?” fumed Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) at a committee hearing Thursday morning. 

“GDP to defense spending is going to be at a historic low under this deal,” he said, arguing that the defense spending cap will also hurt Ukraine in its war against Russia. “There’s not a penny in this deal to help them keep fighting. Do you really want to be judged in history as having, at a moment of consequence to defeat Putin, to pull all the money for Ukraine?” 

Graham suggested Thursday afternoon that Senate Republicans may attempt to renegotiate the defense spending cap set by the debt limit law later this year. 

“There will be conversation among senators and hopefully the House to increase our spending to deter China. Reducing the size of the U.S. Navy doesn’t deter China,” he said. 

Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), the top-ranking Republican on the Appropriations Committee, said she was concerned that "the new debt limit law caps regular defense funding in fiscal year 2024 at the inadequate level requested by the president" and that it "fails to meet the security challenges facing our nation.”

House Republicans have proposed $826 billion for the annual defense appropriations bill, while Senate Democrats have proposed $823 billion for the defense spending bill, keeping in line with the spending caps McCarthy negotiated with Biden.  

Those numbers don’t include defense spending spread across other departments, including the Department of Energy, which oversees the nation’s nuclear arsenal; the Department of Homeland Security; and money allocated for military construction and veterans affairs. 

Graham and Collins are hoping to increase defense spending levels later in the year — possibly by passing a supplemental defense spending bill that includes money for Ukraine — but McCarthy has already poured cold water on the deal.  

“I’m not going to prejudge what some of them [in the Senate] do, but if they think they’re writing a supplemental because they want to go around an agreement we just made, it’s not going anywhere,” he told Punchbowl News earlier this month. 

Adding fuel to the fire, House Republicans have proposed cutting an additional $119 billion from discretionary spending by setting spending targets for the annual spending bills that cumulatively fall well below the caps that Biden and McCarthy agreed to for those programs — $886 billion for defense and $703.7 for nondefense programs.  

House Republicans are proposing finding those additional savings by cutting from nondefense discretionary spending programs, which will likely put pressure on the Department of Homeland Security. 

Meeting the House Republican targets for nondefense programs could entail spending cuts ranging between 15 percent to 30 percent for the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Interior, Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education.  

Such a showdown over spending levels heightens the chances of Senate Democrats and House Republicans failing to agree, and then not passing the regular spending bills, which means they would have to resort to a stopgap spending measure. If they fail to pass all 12 appropriations bills by Dec. 31, that would trigger an across-the-board, 1-percent rescission for all defense and nondefense discretionary spending.  

Senate Republicans warn the 1-percent spending sequester would hit defense programs harder than nondefense programs. 

Graham and Collins also spoke out Thursday against the spending allocations Senate Democrats set for homeland security. 

Homeland Security Department funding is under pressure because of the spending cap Biden and McCarthy agreed to as part of the debt limit deal.  

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-Wash.) said the debt limit deal squeezed federal funding priorities across the board.  

“We were given a top-line [spending number] that was extremely challenging and difficult,” she said. “I would dare say no one on this committee, certainly Sen. Collins or I, would have negotiated that agreement. We were not in the room but we have been given that order.” 

Graham said that under the spending caps agreed to last month, the Homeland Security Department would not have enough money to stem the flow of fentanyl and other drugs across the U.S.-Mexico border. 

“If you’ve looked at the border and you feel like we can spend less on homeland security, you shouldn’t be allowed to drive. This place is falling apart. and fentanyl is killing Americans. We need more, not less, to address that,” he said.  

Graham suggested that the consequences of the spending caps would be severe if kept in place over the long-term. 

“We’re in a tough spot. I like the idea we’re not going to be perpetually bound by this,” he said. 

Collins raised similar concerns.  

“Due to the inadequacy of funding for Homeland Security and the need for additional defense funding, unfortunately I cannot support the 302(b) allocations,” Collins said of the money proposed for the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon. 

“Our crisis at the southern border continues. We are on pace for another 2.2 million encounters with migrants this fiscal year,” she added. “Despite this ongoing calamity, the proposed 302(b) allocation would actually reduce funding for the Department of Homeland Security, limiting our ability to have sufficient personnel and technology at the southern border.” 

Graham and Collins made their comments in reaction to the $56.9 billion in budget authority that Senate Democrats proposed for the annual Homeland Security appropriations bill.  

The Republican-controlled House Appropriations panel has approved $63.9 billion in budget authority for homeland security appropriations. 

Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), the chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, told colleagues at the hearing Thursday morning that he agrees with Graham and Collins that the defense funding levels set forth by the Senate and House are “inadequate.”  

“Am I happy with the defense number? No. I think it’s inadequate, quite frankly,” he said. 

He later told The Hill that he found it ironic that Republicans, who usually like to bill themselves as fiscal hawks, are the ones now looking to get around the spending caps. 

“I just felt like we had flipped positions today. Democrats were able to take the conservative [debt limit] number, and Republicans wanted the more liberal number,” he said.  

Senate rejects House-passed measure overturning Biden rule on pistol braces  

The Senate voted largely along party lines Thursday to reject a Republican-sponsored resolution that would have overturned a Biden administration rule effectively banning the use of stabilizing braces on pistols — devices that have been used in several mass shootings.  

Sens. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Jon Tester (Mont.), two centrist Democrats facing tough reelection races next year in red states, voted against the resolution. They both have a history of supporting gun-owners' rights.

The resolution failed by a vote of 49 to 50. 

President Biden had said he would veto the measure, which the House approved June 13.   

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said repealing the rule effectively banning pistol braces would have made it “easier to conceal an assault-style pistol, something that’s been used in mass shooting after mass shooting.”  

“Shame on them,” he said of Republicans who pushed to overturn the regulation.  

“If you’ve ever seen a gunman fire what looks like a machine gun with one hand, that’s what pistol braces allow you to do,” he said.  

The White House noted in a statement of administration policy that gunmen have used brace devices in mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and Boulder, Colo.  

The resolution, which Republicans moved under the Congressional Review Act, would have nullified the rule finalized in January by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) stating that any stabilizing brace attached to a pistol with a barrel less than 16 inches would be regulated as a “short-barreled rifle” under the 1968 Gun Control Act.   

Congress passed legislation in the 1980s to impose a 10-year prison sentencing enhancement for using a short-barreled rifle in any violent or drug trafficking crime.  

Under the new Biden administration rule, gun owners who have a pistol with a stabilizing brace can either add a longer barrel to the firearm, remove the brace, turn the firearm in to a local ATF office or register it as a short-barreled rifle with federal authorities.  

“Short-barreled rifles are more concealable than long guns, yet more dangerous and accurate at a distance than traditional pistols. For these reasons, they are particularly lethal, which is why Congress has deemed them to be dangerous and unusual weapons subject to strict regulation since 1934,” the Office of Management and Budget said in a June 12 statement of policy.  

The White House budget office said earlier this month that Biden would veto the measure.   

“For almost 90 years, short-barreled rifles have been controlled under the National Firearms Act, along with machine guns and sawed-off shotguns. Why? Because they combine the accuracy of a rifle with the concealability of a handgun. It’s a deadly combination,” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said before the vote.   

Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.), the House sponsor of the resolution, called the ATF rule “unconstitutional” and an example of “executive overreach.”  

The House passed the resolution earlier this month by a largely partisan vote of 219 to 210.  

Two Democrats voted for it and two Republicans voted against it. 

McConnell: Democrats should ‘stay out’ of Supreme Court’s business 

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) says Senate Democrats don’t have any jurisdiction over the Supreme Court’s ethics and should “stay out” of the court’s business, after ProPublica reported conservative Justice Samuel Alito accepted a luxury fishing vacation from wealthy benefactors. 

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), the chairman of a key Judiciary subcommittee, said in response to the report that they will mark up Supreme Court ethics legislation. 

But McConnell sent a strong signal Wednesday that any Supreme Court ethics reform bill is not likely to get enough Republican support to overcome a filibuster. 

“Look, the Supreme Court, in my view, can’t be dictated to by Congress. I think the chief justice will address these issues. Congress should stay out of it, because we don’t, I think, have the jurisdiction to tell the Supreme Court how to handle the issue,” he said. 

McConnell said he has “full confidence” in Chief Justice John Roberts to address any ethical issues facing the court.  

“I have total confidence in Chief Justice John Roberts to in effect look out for the court as well as its reputation,” he said.  

The Senate GOP leader made his comments after ProPublica reported that Alito did not publicly disclose a 2008 trip he took to a luxury fishing lodge in Alaska, and that he flew there aboard a private plane owned by hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer.  

Alito then did not recuse himself in 2014, when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Singer’s hedge fund in a legal battle that resulted in the fund receiving a $2.4 billion payout.  

Alito explained in a Wall Street Journal op-ed responding to ProPublica’s reporting that he was not required to report the trip nor recuse himself from the court case.  

Senate Democrats warned Wednesday that they will take matters into their own hands if Roberts doesn’t announce new ethics guidelines for the high court soon. 

“The highest court in the land should not have the lowest ethical standards.  But for too long that has been the case with the United States Supreme Court.  That needs to change.  That’s why when the Senate returns after the July 4th recess, the Senate Judiciary Committee will mark up Supreme Court ethics legislation,” Durbin and Whitehouse said in a joint statement.  

“We hope that before that time, Chief Justice Roberts will take the lead and bring Supreme Court ethics in line with all other federal judges.  But if the Court won’t act, then Congress must,” they said.  

Whitehouse is the chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts, Oversight, Agency Action and Federal Rights.  

Other Republicans joined McConnell in pushing back against Democratic calls to pass Supreme Court ethics legislation.  

“They’ve been after everybody from Clarence Thomas to anybody they can get their teeth into to try to undermine the credibility of the court. I think all of us need to be concerned about the public confidence in the courts, but this is not something that the Congress has any authority over. This is something the court itself needs to come to grips with,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.  

Republicans rage over Hunter Biden — with some notable exceptions

Republican lawmakers are venting their frustration over what they say is an overly lenient plea agreement between Hunter Biden and federal prosecutors, further escalating GOP tensions with the Justice Department.   

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Tuesday led the backlash from Republican lawmakers.   

“It continues to show the two-tier system in America,” McCarthy told reporters, echoing the arguments Republicans deployed after the Justice Department earlier this month unsealed a 37-count indictment against former President Trump.  

“If you are the president’s leading political opponent, the DOJ tries to literally put you in jail and give you prison time. But if you are the president’s son, you get a sweetheart deal,” McCarthy said.   

Biden agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanors for failing to pay income taxes in 2017 and 2018. He also agreed to enter a pretrial diversion program for possessing a firearm while being an unlawful user or addicted to a controlled substance.   

The plea deal, however, divided Republican leaders, just as Trump’s indictment drew mixed responses from GOP lawmakers last week.   

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) declined to comment about Biden’s legal problems as he walked to the Senate floor Tuesday afternoon.   

His opening remarks on the floor made no mention of the president’s son and focused instead on what he called “the Biden administration’s radical nominees” and Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to Beijing.   

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) also held back from lashing out at the Justice Department, pointing out that the U.S. attorney who cut the deal was a Trump appointee.   

“The justice system, I guess, has got to work its way out. He’s going to plead to a couple tax evasion charges and a gun charge. I don’t know that this is necessarily the end of the road for him, probably not. At least the preliminary stage of it is done,” Thune told reporters.  

Asked about Republican criticisms of a two-tiered system and a sweetheart deal, Thune said: “I don’t know what else they got on him, but I do think the American people have to be convinced that the justice system treats everybody equally under the law.”  

“This was a — my understanding is at least — Trump-appointed U.S. attorney. So we’ll see where it goes from here,” he added.   

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) wasn’t in the mood Tuesday to delve into the political wrangling over Hunter Biden’s plea deal.  

“I don’t have any reaction, ask me about something else,” she said. 

On the other side of the Capitol, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) echoed McCarthy’s claim of a “two-tiered system of justice.”   

“Hunter Biden is getting away with a slap on the wrist when growing evidence uncovered by the House Oversight Committee reveals the Bidens engaged in a pattern of corruption, influence peddling, and possibly bribery,” he said.    

Republican lawmakers for months have pushed allegations based on anonymous sources that Biden received preferential treatment from the Internal Revenue Service and was involved in a bribery scheme with a Ukrainian energy company.   

But those thinly sourced claims were left unaddressed by a document outlining the plea agreement that U.S. Attorney David Weiss, a Trump appointee, filed with the U.S. district court in Wilmington, Del.  

Comer vowed to continue his investigation, pledging: “We will not rest until the full extent of President Biden’s involvement in the family’s schemes are revealed.”  

The Republican National Committee on Tuesday tweeted out a video clip of one of Hunter Biden’s attorneys telling MSNBC he didn’t remember prosecutors ever asking about Biden’s infamous laptop.   

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has highlighted unverified allegations by an anonymous foreign national that the Bidens were involved in a bribery scheme, pointed out that Weiss, the U.S. attorney, said his investigation of Hunter Biden is ongoing.   

Asked if he expected additional charges, Grassley said: “All I know is what Weiss said, the case is still open.”   

“Today’s plea deal cannot be the final word given the significant body of evidence that the FBI and Justice Department has at its disposal. It certainly won’t be for me,” he said in a statement released earlier Tuesday.  

He said he and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) sent material, including bank records, to the U.S. attorney, and it "doesn’t look to me like Weiss gave much credit to it with this very weak result that was announced today.”  

Johnson, who has worked closely with Grassley, said “it stinks to high heaven.”  

“The fact that they have now an IRS whistleblower coming forward and saying that the entire IRS investigatory team almost in unprecedented fashion was pulled off the case [and it] sounds like there’s allegations that they on purpose they allowed the statute of limitations to expire on more serious charges — there’s so many things that I would want investigated in terms of Hunter Biden,” he said.

Other Republican senators joined in the attacks on the Justice Department.   

Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.) called the plea deal “a slap on the wrist.”   

“This doesn’t show equal justice. It’s a mockery of our legal system by a family that has no respect for our laws,” he said.  

National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Steve Daines (R-Mont.), who has endorsed Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign, called it “nothing more than a wrist slap from his dad’s DOJ.”  

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) called the deal “troubling.”   

Lee retweeted criticisms of the agreement circulated by Brett Tolman, the executive director of Right On Crime, a conservative advocacy group, who said pretrial diversion programs normally exclude offenses involving the brandishing a firearm.  

Many Senate and House Republicans lashed out against Attorney General Merrick Garland and special counsel Jack Smith last week after the Justice Department charged Trump with violations of the Espionage Act and conspiring to obstruct justice.  

They also argued the lack of charges against President Biden, who kept classified documents from his service in the Senate and vice president in the Obama administration, showed the federal prosecution of Trump was motivated by politics.   

“So Hunter Biden gets a special plea deal, slap on the wrist — probably won’t do a day of time — while DOJ charges Trump as a spy and tries to put him in prison forever. Two standards of ‘justice,’” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) tweeted in response to the deal.   

One Senate Republican aide said Hunter Biden appeared to get a fairly lenient deal from the Justice Department but pointed out he cooperated with prosecutors, in contrast to Trump.

“Of course, Hunter got off easy, but he cooperated, unlike Trump,” the aide said, noting the special counsel’s indictment against the former president alleges Trump deliberately misled his lawyer about cooperating with a grand jury subpoena.   

Democrats on Tuesday argued the charges against Biden, coming just a week after the prosecutors unsealed the indictment of Trump, shows the Justice Department is applying the law fairly.   

“Neither Hunter Biden nor Donald Trump are above the law. They’re both held responsible and are going to go through the process. Joe Biden’s son just did, just completed it,” said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.). 

Emily Brooks and Al Weaver contributed.

GOP fears Trump legal woes will boomerang on them 

Senate Republicans are worried former President Trump’s legal troubles will create a major headwind for GOP candidates in 2024.  

They say the battle between the Justice Department and Trump, who pleaded not guilty Tuesday to charges that he violated the Espionage Act and obstructed justice with his handling of classified documents, will become a primary litmus test — just as his unsubstantiated claims that the 2020 election was stolen became a prominent point of debate in last year’s GOP primaries.  

They also worry Trump’s dominance of the media spotlight will turn off swing voters — especially suburban women — and hurt their chances of taking back the Senate or protecting their small House majority.

Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), who has endorsed Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) for president, told reporters on Tuesday there’s “no question” the “serious” allegations against Trump will hurt the GOP if he is the nominee.  

Rounds said voters will ultimately decide whether the charges disqualify Trump from holding office, but he predicted they will create a headwind.

“Voters are going to make that determination, but most certainly for a lot of us as you look at that, it’s not going to help,” he said. “This is not good for our party, clearly not good for our party.”

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) also warned Republicans will pay the price if Trump and his various legal battles dominate the political debate next year. 

“I think if you look at the record, in ’18, ’20, and ’22, when he’s the issue, we lose,” Thune said, referring to Republicans’ loss of the House in the 2018 midterm election, their loss of the White House and Senate in the 2020 election and Senate Republicans’ failure to take back the upper chamber in 2022.  

“I would rather have the issue be Biden and his policies. I think the way that you do that is you have a different nominee,” said Thune, who has also endorsed Scott for president.

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.)

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) speaks during the weekly press conference following the Republican luncheon at the Capitol on Tuesday, June 13, 2023.

Asked whether he was worried the indictment could drag down the party in 2024, Thune replied: “I’m worried obviously about the Senate races.” 

“There’s no question the political environment affects that, and the top of the ticket is part of the political environment,” he said.  

Thune acknowledged the legal battle could help Trump in a primary, but he argued it would hurt the GOP at large in a general election.

“Everybody says, ‘Well, it gives him a political bump,’ and all that, and that may be true with the political base but, again, the people who decide national elections are the middle of the electorate. It’s the soccer moms, it’s the suburban voters, it’s younger voters, and I just think we’ve got a candidate who can appeal to those,” he said.  

“A lot of the drama and the chaos that seems to be happening with an ongoing basis [with Trump] makes it harder to win those types of voters,” Thune observed.


More Senate coverage from The Hill


Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told reporters after last year’s disappointing midterm election that the “chaos” and “negativity” surrounding Trump hurt Senate GOP candidates, though he didn’t mention Trump by name.

On Tuesday, however, McConnell declined to go anywhere near Trump’s legal troubles when asked whether he would support the former president if he wins the party’s nomination. 

“I’m just simply not going to comment on the candidates,” he said when asked about supporting Trump, noting the Republican presidential primary has been playing out for the past six months and will last for another year. 

Asked about the indictment itself and whether Trump did anything wrong, McConnell replied: “I’m not going to start commenting on the various candidates we have running for president. There are a lot of them; it’s going to be interesting to watch.” 

McConnell’s caution reflects in part the fact many GOP senators and Senate Republican candidates remain ardent fans of the former president.  

Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) missed an important vote Tuesday on Biden’s nominee to serve as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers; he was headed to Trump’s New Jersey golf club to attend a Trump rally.

Also on Tuesday, first-term Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio) announced he would put a hold on Biden’s nominees to the Justice Department to protest the federal prosecution of Trump.  

“If Merrick Garland wants to use these officials to harass Joe Biden’s political opponents, we will grind his department to a halt,” Vance said in a statement. 

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio)

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) asks questions during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Tuesday, May 16, 2023 to discuss the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank in March.

Vance’s hold will require Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) to go through the time-consuming process of scheduling votes on individual nominees.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) told reporters Tuesday that the Justice Department’s indictment will have a “galvanizing effect” on Republican voters and predicted Trump, who has a big lead in national and key primary state polls, will be the party’s nominee.  

“I think voters see [the indictment] for what it is. It is politically motivated, clearly,” he said.

He noted that Trump has already faced two impeachment trials and multiple accusations over the years, including his recent indictment on 34 felony charges by the Manhattan district attorney and a jury’s decision to award author E. Jean Carroll $5 million in damages after finding the former president liable for sexual abuse and defamation.  

“There’s always a lot of a lot around President Trump,” he said.  

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He disagreed with Senate Republican colleagues who blame Trump for the failure to win back the majority last year.  

“If Senate Republicans want to blame somebody for that, we should go get a mirror,” he said.

A June 7-10 CBS/YouGov poll of 2,480 adults showed Trump leading his nearest rival, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, by 38 percentage points. The survey recontacted 1,798 respondents after the federal indictment was unsealed.