Overseas online review: The United States has opened the "Pandora's Box" of judicial politicization. Politics | Justice | The United States
On April 4th, former US President Trump left after appearing in court in New York. Shen Jizhong
[Editor's note]
Former US President Trump has recently been criminally prosecuted by the Federal Department of Justice, escalating the bipartisan conflict and exposing a plethora of political chaos in the United States, as well as the persistent ailments of American style democracy. This is the second article in the "American Democracy Rebellion" series of comments released by overseas online reviews.
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The matter of former US President Trump being criminally prosecuted by the federal government is fermenting. On August 3rd local time, Trump appeared in federal court in the US capital Washington D.C. and pleaded not guilty to all charges. When he left the court, he stated that the prosecution was against his election conspiracy and claimed to be a victim of "political persecution.". His statement is consistent with previous Republican criticisms of the Biden administration's use of judicial weapons to interfere in the election, and once again puts the recently questioned US judicial system at the forefront of the debate.
As early as March this year, when New York State District Prosecutors filed a criminal lawsuit over "sealing fees," Trump and many Republicans believed that this was the Democratic Party's abuse of judicial power for "political persecution," and direct evidence of the Democratic Party's weaponization of judicial power. On August 1st, Trump's campaign team issued a statement stating that the lawsuit was a product of a "weaponized Department of Justice.". Republican Senator John Balaso claimed that the indictment revealed the existence of a "dual judicial system" in the United States. Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, McKinsey, compared the charges faced by Trump to the related cases involving President Biden's son, Hunter Biden, stating that "if Hunter Biden were a Republican, he would have been imprisoned long ago.".
The Democratic Party has maintained a low profile in its attacks on the Republican Party. Attorney General Merrick Garland denied that the investigation was politically motivated, while Biden stated that he respects the independence of the Department of Justice. The White House simply remained silent on the prosecution. But against the backdrop of intensifying social party disputes and rampant conspiracy theories in the United States, a Republican who is highly likely to confront Biden in next year's presidential election is constantly being sued by the judiciary. How much confidence can the American people have in the "neutrality" and "integrity" of the judiciary?
The struggle between the two parties over the weaponization of the judiciary is merely the result of the current politicization of the US judicial system. In recent years, the judicial power, which usually plays a balancing role in the "separation of powers" system in the United States, has continuously rushed to the forefront of political struggles, becoming a tool for bipartisan struggles and even conflicts. Taking the US Supreme Court as an example, this institution is the final appellate court of the US judicial system and the ultimate interpreter of the US Constitution. Currently, there are six conservative justices and three liberal justices, which is the result of a bipartisan struggle: in 2016, Obama's nomination for liberal justices was blocked by the Republican controlled Senate; In 2017, 2018, and 2020, with the support of the Republican Senate, Trump was able to nominate three conservative justices, giving conservatives a 6:3 majority in control of the Supreme Court. And these justices have also repeatedly made rulings in favor of conservatives, with law professor and political scientist Epstein from the University of Southern California stating in an interview with The New York Times that the court has evolved into a divided, extremist, and radical court.
The politicization of the judicial system has further exacerbated the polarization in the United States. At the end of June this year, the Supreme Court of the United States made three consecutive rulings in favor of the conservative Republican Party on issues related to race, education, and minority rights, sparking public dissatisfaction. The ruling of the Supreme Court on gun control and women's rights in 2022 has ignited anger in American society, and Biden has directly stated that "the current Supreme Court is not a normal court.". An increasingly politicized and partisan judicial system will only fuel the tearing polarization of American society. The latest opinion poll by ABC shows that over three-quarters of Democratic voters currently believe that the Supreme Court's ruling is politically driven, while one-third of Republican voters and more than half of independent politicians hold this view. Compared to the results in January 2022, the number of people who believe that the US judicial system is politically hostage has increased by 20%.
Social division threatens judicial power, bipartisan struggles spread to the judicial system, and Supreme Court rulings increasingly reflect the huge differences between conservative and liberal "two America", becoming increasingly a tool of political struggle... When justice, the bottom line of maintaining fairness and justice, can be used to trade, American democracy becomes a laughingstock.
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