Chief Justice John Roberts offered a pointed response to those unhappy with recent Supreme Court rulings, urging the public to remember that justices are simply interpreting the law—even if the outcome is unpopular.
“It would be good if people appreciated it’s not the judges’ fault that a correct interpretation of the law meant that, no, you don’t get to do this,” Roberts said Friday at a judicial conference, speaking just one day after the court issued several high-profile and controversial decisions.
Although he didn’t name specific cases, one of those rulings handed a major victory to President Donald Trump, allowing his revised birthright citizenship order to move forward after being blocked by lower courts.
Roberts, in conversation with the chief judge of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, said criticism is inevitable in his role.
“Every case has a winner and a loser,” he noted. “You’d like it to be informed criticism, but it’s usually not. People focus on the bottom line: who won and who lost.”
Tensions Inside the Court
The criticism hasn’t come solely from the public. Some of the court’s sharpest disagreements have come from within.
In the majority opinion supporting Trump’s birthright citizenship changes, Justice Amy Coney Barrett took aim at Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s dissent, accusing it of ignoring centuries of precedent.
“We will not dwell on Justice Jackson’s argument, which is at odds with more than two centuries’ worth of precedent, not to mention the Constitution itself,” Barrett wrote. “Justice Jackson decries an imperial Executive while embracing an imperial Judiciary.”
Jackson fired back in her dissent, warning that the decision opened the door for unchecked presidential power.
“The Judiciary – the one institution that is solely responsible for ensuring our Republic endures as a Nation of laws – has put both our legal system, and our system of government, in grave jeopardy,” she wrote.
A Court Divided, But Still Talking
Roberts acknowledged the divisions on the court, particularly as the term draws to a close and the most consequential decisions are released.
“There can be sharp divisions and sharp adjectives,” he said. But despite those disagreements, the justices work to understand each other’s viewpoints. “It’s important to know what Justice So-and-So is thinking about, because that will help you understand a little bit more about yours.”
Roberts admitted the end of the term felt rushed this year and said the court would try to avoid that in the future. “Things were a little crunched toward the end this year,” he said.
As the Supreme Court closes a term marked by high-stakes decisions and intensifying public scrutiny, Roberts’ comments reflect both the pressure on the court and the internal efforts to manage that tension — even when the country is sharply divided over its rulings.
