scan the qr code now to download it for free today or visit our website, c-span.org. c-span now, your front seat to washington anytime, anywhere. the c-span bookshelf podcast feed makes it easy for you to listen to all of c- span's podcasts that feature nonfiction books in one place you can discover new authors and ideas. each week, we are making it convenient for you to listen to multiple episodes with critically acclaimed officers discussing history, biography, events, and culture. for signature conversations about our books, afterwards, but notes plus, and q&a, listen to c-span's bookshelf podcast feed today, you can find the c- span podcast feed and all of our podcasts on the free c- span now mobile video app or wherever you get your podcasts and on our website, c-span.org. we want to welcome back to our table, wall street journal

supreme court correspondent jess bravin here to talk about the high court, and after this election, there is speculation that there could be some vacancies that president-elect trump would then get to fill. what are the validity of these rumors? >> well, it is interesting, i mean, there was historically a time when the supreme court was seen as something apart from politics, and you would see members of one party, senators of one party vote for a nominee of another. most recently, we know that justice anthony scalia was approved unanimously by the senate, justice ruth bader ginsburg, i think there were three "no" votes against her. those days are over and now the supreme court is just treated as another political prize by the two parties. we saw that after the death of

scalia in 2016, when republicans wouldn't consider any nominee by president obama, and we saw that again more recently in 2020 when justice ginsburg died and republicans rushed to confirm amy coney barrett to her seat shortly before they lost control of both the white house and the senate. so, now, we have three justices who are in their 70s and both democratic and republican activists speculated that it would be an opportune time for them to find other hobbies, rather than judging our nation's laws. and immediately, it was liberals who talked about justice sonja soda mayor the member of the liberal walk of the court, seven years old appointed by barack obama in 2009, so if she were to step aside in theory, the democrats, president biden, could nominate a successor, democratic senate could confirm her before they turn the senate er to republicans in january. similarly, republicans, knowing that they don't want that to happen to their ideological

allies, what happened to the liberals when justice ginsburg died, they were looking at two of the elder conservatives on the court, justice clarence thomas, who was appointed in 1991 by president george hw bush. he is approaching the record ly for tenure on the court. he is 76 years old. justice samuel alito, 74 years old, appointed in 2006 by president george w. bush. these rumors began circulating, we saw articles about it, we al saw pundits talking about it. no senators explicitly asking for this, but the chatter certainly reached the supreme court, because we talked to people close to the justices and found they were annoyed -- maybe that is the word -- by this kind of speculation, and we reported, i think, fairly confidently, that neither

justice sonia sotomayor nor l justice alito has plans to leave right now for purposes of political expediency. >> on alito, here is your headline, justice samuel alito plans to remain on the supreme court. let's talk about this current document, what cases they are looking at, can you describe, big picture, what will be presented before the high court? >> well, compared to the last term, where we saw the case about presidential power that paved the way for president- elect trump to return to the white house, we saw cases involving abortion, we saw a very, very controversial and important issue. so far, the docket this term is not as significant. of course, it is to the parties and the cases and some are very important, there is a case about a transgender youth that is coming up in december. there are other significant cases, as there always are, by

definition of the supreme court. but, we haven't seen the kinds of things like major abortion rights, or affirmative action, or executive power cases, that we had in recent years during the biden administration. but, we are likely to see some, after president trump returns to the white house, and if he does implement what is a, one can say, bold re-conception of separation of powers, under our constitution structure, if he does do that, there is likely to be litigation that will end up back at the supreme court, whether that is dismantling the civil service, as it has been known since the 1800s, and proposing recess appointments, in the manner he has suggested with congress deliberately going out of session so that he could do so, these issues, as well as a massive immigration roundup, many of the things he has talked about, are very aggressive assertions of power and they may face some challenges under our structure. >> are there groups out there gearing up for a potential lawsuit on those fronts? >> oh, for sure, because -- and by the way, we have seen this

under presidents obama and trump one, and biden, as well, that when they take certain steps that are opposed, particularly by their ideological opposites, they end up in court, and sometimes they win, but not always. so, yes, for sure, one front that has immediately opened up, our state attorney generals from democratic states, they have made clear that when they heard that president-elect trump campaigning, promising to be a dictator on day one, they heard that, and they thought, that is not what we are into. and they actually began gearing up their own litigation to be ready to respond if he does things that they believe infringe on their own states' prerogatives. there are activist groups that view president-elect trump's campaign agenda as contrary to many of the things they believe in.

environmental groups, the aclu -- which has an aggressive civil liberties perspective -- they have all said that they are ready to respond in court, if the new president does things they believe are legally in error. >> you also mentioned the idea of recess appointments. the president-elect has picked some controversial folks to possibly lead agencies. matt gaetz and others, that is the reporting this morning. the president-elect has said on sunday that he would like whoever becomes senate leader to push some of these folks through in a recess appointment. why would that present a legal challenge or prayer -- potential legal challenge? >> well, let's remember what a recess appointment is. in the constitution, anyone whoa is not an officer of the united

states needs to be confirmed by the u.s. senate. or, at least anyone who is a principal officer of the united states. those are the top positions, the ones people are most concerned about. cabinet secretaries and other high ranking officials. there is a stopgap provision in the constitution that says when the senate is in recess, the president can make a temporary appointment that lasts through the session of congress, and i think that was drafted in the 1700s because they didn't exactly have the kinds of communications or transportation technology that we suffer under today, you might say. so, no offense the cable viewers. so, there is that stopgap provision. over the years, presidents have often tried to use it as a workaround when they run into obstacles in the senate with some of their appointees. presidents reagan, bush, clinton, obama, they have all used recess appointments to try to get around the senate, maybe for more controversial nominees, or maybe just because the senate is really, really

slow sometimes in getting around to its business. about 10 years ago, four recess appointees to the national relations board that obama put forward, were challenged by businesses that lost rulings in the lrb, they said these members aren't legitimately in office because it was an illegal recess appointment. supreme court agreed and said actually for the first time, what counts as a recess. and it is 10 days. a 10 day span. if it is longer than 10 days, then it is a recess. if it is shorter than 10 days, then it is not really a recess, and it is not really appropriate to use that provision. so, the senate could then automatically prevent recess appointments, which is generally what they try to do, by simply having fake sessions, pro-form sessions. they dabble themselves into session, gavel themselves out, and they are done. you know, that -- so, recess appointments really went away. what trump is asking for is unprecedented, according to our

reporting and discussions with senate historians. they are asking the senate to deliberately go out of business so he can appoint people to high offices without their advice and consent. and that seems to be an unprecedented ask, at least publicly, and something the senate has never done. generally, they try to protect their power against the executive, rather than advocate in favor of it. >> we are talking with jess bravin, the wall street journal corresponded. join the conversation by dialing in this morning. democrats, 202-478-4800. republicans 202478001. and independence, your mind this morning is 202-748-8002. remember, you can text us, as well. include your first name, city, and state, to 202-804-8003. let's go to mary lou in newington, connecticut, an independent. hi, mary lou. good morning. your turn. good morning. yes, hi. i am talking about the supreme

court because everybody is so worried about age. look, i am 92 years old and i know what i am doing, i have all my faculties, and i am just as smart -- or, done, if you want to say -- as smart as i ever was. and my age has nothing to do with it. it is your health. and because of medicine, advances in medicine, that is why we are all living so much longer. but, that doesn't mean -- look, people at 89, 90, 85, a lot of them, i play cards four days a week with people that age. we know what we are doing. >> all right, mary lou. well, let's talk. are there any of the sitting justices who have health concerns? >> firstly, mary lou, congratulations on making it to your 90s and we hope there will be many, many more years ahead

for you in connecticut. the issue is not really that these justices are losing their marbles. no one is suggesting that any member of the court is incapable of doing the job, and viewers can find out for themselves, listen to the arguments on the supreme court website or on c-span's library and see, you will see that they are all quite with it. that is not the issue. the issue, as mary lou said, is health. ruth bader ginsburg was all there in her mind up until the end, but she was 87 and had a lot of health problems, and health issues, and age sometimes is correlated, and that really is what people are talking about. supreme court justices serve for life, so when you talk about the supreme court, you are looking at basically the geological timescale as opposed to the political cycles of the house, senate, and white house, with turnover with regular frequency. so, that is really what we are looking at. justice thomas has been there

since 1991, right? i mean, that is a long time on the supreme court. and so, since these vacancies occur so rarely, and can occur without any planning, as in the unexpected deaths of justice scalia and justice ginsburg, people who care about the ideological direction of the court are making these calculations. the justices, we don't know exactly how much they are calculating the stuff in there, but they don't like this kind of talk, and one of the influential people on the right, leonard leo, who advised president trump on his appointments in the first trump administration, and remains a very powerful figure in the conservative legal movement, he said the other day -- this is almost an exact quote, not exact -- but he said, you know, it is rather undignified to treat justices like they are expired meet in the grocery store. so, you know, he is trying to tamp down that talk, too, maybe because it might have the wrong impact.

could have a contrary impact on what the justices decide to do. but, anyway, that's -- >> in these final weeks, the 118th congress, senate democrats, are moving to expeditiously approved federal judges before the president's ch term ends. explained that procedure, and how both parties have used it to try to shape the judiciary? why is it important to watch? >> well, you know, in theory, the law is the law, and the judges will all apply it fairly. and we have to say that as far as we know, all justices do apply it fairly, it is just what they think is fair and what the law requires depends a lot on their jewish prudential philosophy, what they think the constitutions, principles really mean and so forth, so there is a big, big difference between what liberal, and progressive, and democratic inclined lawyers think about the law, and what conservative, and republican, and maybe all libertarian lawyers think about the law and what the

constitution is calling for, and how to apply it. so, each side tries to get bu people who share their philosophy into these positions, and maybe in 95% of the cases, it doesn't make any difference. you committed murder, you didn't commit murder. you know? you embezzled from the bank, or you didn't. but, in some of the issues where the law and the constitution is not perfectly clear, it requires an extra step, and that is what these battles are really, really about. you know, at the lower federal courts, it is very easy for judges to time their retirements, because they can take something called senior status. that allows them, if they have served -- served a certain number of years, to really continue on the job, to really continue working almost for free because they would get a similar pay if they were retired, but they can remain

judges, remain hearing cases and so on, but their seat opens up and it can be filled, so you will often see toward the end of an administration -- or, beginning, depending -- judges appointed by a democrat or a ar republican taking senior status at that time to create a vacancy that the new republican or democratic president can fill. and that is mainly what we are seeing with the biden administration and what we saw with the previous trump administration. of course, sometimes, judges die in office, unfortunately. sometimes, they quit entirely so that they can work in private practice, or what have you. but, that is what we are seeing, there. >> we will go to david in massachusetts, independent. hi, david. we are talking about the supreme court. good morning to you. >> how are you? >> doing well. question or comment for our guest? >> i have kind of a comment, question, i guess. a lot of women have complained, when trump put a couple people on the supreme court that they a voted against roe v wade and they don't think that men should have any say in it, yet in 1972, there are only men on the supreme court.

so, now there are women, and we have them vote against it, what is the problem? i mean, they want to stuff the supreme court now, and i want to find out what he thinks of that, of adding more people? >> what do women want? well, i can't really answer that age-old question, but i can say that, you know, one's view of the law is not necessarily determined by one's anatomy. but, we have seen that, in general, women are more supportive of abortion rights than men have been. that doesn't determine what any individual may think. we noticed statistically, that is true, and we don't want to look to general statistics in the supreme court and address what they think. when other abortion cases have come up, when we saw, in fact, the case that overturned roe v wade in 2022, you had two women and one man dissenting from that, justice stephen breyer

was among the dissenters, and you had a woman in the majority to overrule roe v wade, amy coney barrett. i think it is hard to extrapolate onto the supreme court, stereotypes of what women or men might think about this issue. politically, and the great abstraction of hundreds of millions of americans, we do know statistically that women are more supportive of abortion rights than men are. i don't think that comes down to which gender they want to see appointed to the supreme a court. >> are there more legal questions for the supreme court to answer on the issue of abortion? >> there are tons of questions about abortion that the supreme court may be called upon to answer. some, they had to answer in the last term involving a conflict between the biden administration's application of federal law about emergency rooms, and state laws that banned abortion. the biden administration said that if a woman shows up at an emergency room and has a grave health issue that calls for an abortion, or she would lose her fertility, or some other

important bodily capacity, then federal law requires the emergency room to provide one. state of idaho said, "no, it doesn't. we have a law on abortion, that is not medical care in our state." that was a decision that came before the supreme court and they didn't answer it. they fought off the ultimate question for a future case. there are other issues that may arise. some states have discussed trying to criminalize travel to other states where abortion is lawful. whether they can prosecute someone who leaves their state to obtain an abortion elsewhere is a question. there is a question about whether an antique federal law from the 19th century makes it illegal to send abortion medication through the mail. there are many, many questions that could arise under this. ur and then, we don't know what legislation the congress may take up, or the administration under president trump may

propagate to further restrict abortion. we know they are not going to expand it, the question is whether they will take affirmative steps to make it harder to get in states where it is already lawful. >> people go to jim, a republican in idaho. hi, jim. >> hello. by law, if you have four democrat judges, then by law, we got to have four republican judges, that way you can't do party favors. they've got to move legally. thank you. >> you know, 4-4 = 8 and eight is an equal number. so, what happens when they split on a case? that is actually not very efficient for a court, when they have to make a decision and the legal answer is "yes" or "no." the supreme court learned that early in its tenure, because the first supreme court had six members and the congress changed it to an odd number,

because when you need a majority, you need an odd number. there is no partisan requirement for the u.s. supreme court. the justices don't think of themselves as democrats or republicans, even if the public tends to. it is true that, right now, all the conservatives were appointed by republicans, although liberals were appointed by democrats, but that has not always been true. one of the most progressive chief justices in our history, was a lifelong republican, republican candidate for president, republican nominee for vice president, republican governor of california, and he issued in a civil rights revolution that ended school segregation, expanded criminal defendant rights, did many other things conservatives are a still steamed about today. on the other hand, you had some appointees of democrats that t turned out to be more conservative. one of the two dissenters of roe v wade in 1973 was justice byron white, who had been appointed by president kennedy. and had been a major deputy attorney general in the kennedy justice department. so, there have been more variation in past years.

right now, we see very strong identification between appointing party and judicial philosophy of the justice. >> what is the public view of the supreme court? and are the justices, the current justices, concerned about it? >> well, you know, there is a -- the public view, from what we have seen for many opinion nl surveys and academic studies, right now, is negative, on the supreme court. it is at historic lows of public popularity. or, confidence. and that is mainly since the year 2020, when justice ginsburg died, and justice barrett was appointed and the court shifted very hard to the right. that, because a 6-3 court can move much more aggressively than a 5-4 court where any single justice could say conceivably blake -- break any

stalemate or find a compromise which is what we had when justice kennedy, justice o'connor were on the court in previous years. the main reason that the courts popularity has fallen is that democrats, and to a lesser degree, independence, have lost confidence and republican confidence has stayed about the same. the reason that is problematic, legal scholars say, is that the key to the legitimacy and credibility of a court is whether the losers think they were treated fairly. whether the losers say, i don't like this out,, i am disappointed by it, i understand it, i disagree with it, i accept it. that is what we pretty much had until 2020, because the court was not so easily pigeonholed as tracking a particular ideological agenda. if you won one day, maybe you would win or lose another day. right now, however, the court has lost the confidence of people who think they are

losing unfairly, and that is really what scholars say is a problem. now, from the supreme court point of view, you can also put it this way, they are not supposed to care about popularity, they are supposed to care about what is right. even if the majority of people disagree, they look back to the 50s were the court started dismantling segregation in the united states. that was not possible in a region of the country, the south. more popular in the north. but, the court went ahead with it even though it was very popular and they faced a great deal of resistance in the areas where those decisions were taking effect, so it is hard to draw the line. but, the court has lost the respect that it had across the board in previous decades. >> what was the impact of alleged ethics violations? and has the court responded? >> that is hard to say. it certainly hasn't helped the court, but we do know that -- i looked at a recent survey by burke in law school early this year, and the net disapproval rating, the public disapproval

the greatest disapproval were justices thomas and cavanaugh, and those are the ones were best known to the public for certain ethical or behavior questions that were raised. i haven't seen studies that ur focused exactly on the ethics issue, but headlines and reports that say, oh, there were these undisclosed gifts from billionaires and so on, that can be helpful to a course that wants to see themselves above these crass considerations. there is no allegation, by the way, of bribery or anything like that. it is a bit more of a squish your question, when you are closely associated with extremely wealthy people who have their own ideological agendas before the court. what does that say about the court's independence? we are not seeing any kind of quid pro quo allegation, we are just saying, does that look right? that seems to be about what ethics scholars are asking. >> james in scottsdale, arizona.

an independent. hello, jane. >> hello, good morning. >> good morning. >> basically, to be completely honest, i was mostly a lifelong democrat until maybe like 10 years ago. i really switched to the independent party mostly because of the problems we seem to be having nowadays with media. and listening to mr. bravin, i have some questions for him because i feel like he really skews what he is saying and it is not very factual. >> in what way, jane? in what way? >> well, one of the things he s pointed out was that trump said that, you know, he was going to become a dictator. i mean, he never said these things, but yet the media pushes these narratives, and it is such a turning off to people like me who are independent, because it is so falsely skewed. just like i am pro-abortion, i think the states should be looking at the abortion rights and have some sort of abortion

rights, okay? maybe not to the extent like new york where you can terminate two days after the baby is born but, you know, something logical. in arizona, we had things that set 14 weeks for abortion, and then all of a sudden they put it on the ballot and they acted like it was just, you know, you were voting for or against a abortion. but, what we really were mmvoti for was an abortion up to six months. edit past and nobody seems to care, but i do think at six months, that is a little excessive. >> okay, jane, we will take your comments. jess bravin? >> well, trump p did say, you c say he didn't mean it or he was joking, he did say, i am paraphrasing, i don't have the quote in front of me, but he did say, i'm not going to be a dictator, except maybe on day one and that is the way he put it and his administration is preparing a lot a very, very ambitious executive orders that they plan to issue on day one,

so i don't understand what is not factual about that. i don't understand what is not factual for some people that don't agree with his agenda listen to his assertion that he is going to be very aggressive on the first day, and getting ready to respond to policies that had have legal questions about, so i don't understand the assertion that that is not factual. i mean, what is not factual about reciting what he said? you know, and again, as far as -- you know, and i would ask this, there are a lot of people who do criticize the news media and the news media should not be immune from criticism, but when you say they got something wrong, how do you know that? you know that because you read that some place. unless you were there in person. so, it is some form of media that you are relying on, and the credibility of it, well, that is usually established overtime. i am proud to say that the publication i work for, established in 1889, has a very good reputation for credibility that stands up more than a century and i think that is

true for other major news organizations. so, let's not be so hasty to dismiss news organizations that have tremendous institutional commitment to accuracy, and to correcting errors when they make them. >> how important to you, as a journalist, is your reputation? >> well, it is essential, because we have no -- unlike the court, whether you are liked or disliked by the public, they have to be obeyed. we do not, as journalists. what we do, is right out there every day. and i hear from readers who, often times, what they think of as an error is actually news they wish wasn't true. or, viewpoints expressed in an article that sources say, not us, as journalists, sources say, that they disagree with it. and confusion among these wh things, i think, is unfortunate. news media has let the public down, i think, in not really explaining how it works, how it

decides what is credible information and what is not, what it decides to publish and what not to publish, and what matters, and what doesn't. the public deserves to know a lot more about how those decisions are made and how facts are verified. but, simply saying, oh, i don't like what i read, therefore it is not true, that is not a fair way to look at -- the people in the news media works very hard to prevent. >> you can follow jess bravin's reporting if you follow jess bravin on x. wsj.com online or wsj on x, as well. jess bravin, senior corresponded with the wall street journal, we appreciate you talking to our viewers. thank you very much. >> thanks, viewers. s aid, prest elect trump said monday he would declare a national emergency and is the military to execute his mass deportation plan. an activist said earlier this month on social media that reports are in coming that trump is preparing to declare a national emergency