Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., accused Democrats of trying to "destroy" conservative Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas with a bill blocked by Senate Republicans earlier in June and additionally said Americans are living under a "reckless" president.
The act, which Senate Republicans ultimately blocked, would have altered financial disclosure requirements, ethical standards and recusal requirements that apply to Supreme Court justices, according to the bill's summary.
"The worst thing that could happen is for the United States Senate and the House to determine what cases the Supreme Court hears. The bill that he talked about was killed on the floor of the Senate because it would allow lower court judges to determine when a Supreme Court justice should be recused," he said, responding to Sen. Chris Coons', D-Del., rhetoric regarding the Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency (SCERT) Act on "Fox News Sunday."
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The bill would have additionally expanded "the circumstances under which a Justice or judge must be disqualified" and required "Supreme Court and the Judicial Conference to establish procedural rules for prohibiting the filing of or striking an amicus brief that would result in the disqualification of a Justice, judge, or magistrate judge," according to the summary.
"It was a constitutional overreach. They're trying to micromanage the Roberts court. They're trying to destroy Alito and Thomas because they don't like the fact they're conservative judges," Graham told host Shannon Bream.
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"I like Chris [Coons], but in his world, the people over there are part of a political team that when Democrats fail at the ballot box, people over there will fix the problem from a liberal perspective. Donald Trump changed the court. They're squealing like stuck pigs because the Supreme Court no longer is a political body. It is actually looking at the Constitution and making constitutionally sound decisions versus political decisions. That's the problem liberals have with the court."
The South Carolina senator opposed the measure in conjunction with several GOP allies, including Sens. John Kennedy of Louisiana and Mike Lee of Utah, according to an NBC report.
President Biden has homed in on the Supreme Court with his own criticism, remarking at a recent Hollywood fundraiser that the High Court has "never been as out-of-kilter as it is today."
Graham, responding to the idea that Democrats should focus on dissatisfaction with the Supreme Court, said they would lose unless they convince the public the court is flawed.
"Most Americans believe that they're not safer under President Biden than they were under Trump," he said.
"Chris Coons, a dear friend, said that there's a good case to be made that you're safer today than you were when President Trump was president. If you believe that, you shouldn't be allowed to drive. That's silly. That's dangerously wrong. The border is beyond broken. You have wars in Ukraine. You have the Mid-East on fire. When it comes to enforcing the law, Joe Biden has been beyond reckless."
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