The Supreme Court just announced a code of conduct for its justices. This comes after years of demands that members of the nation’s highest court be held to the highest standard of ethics. Here’s one problem, though: this code of conduct doesn’t include any way to enforce it. In other words, it’s useless.

This announcement is an acknowledgment that public trust in the Court has plummeted. But this won’t solve the problem. It’s insulting to the American people’s intelligence that the Supreme Court proposed an ethics code without enforcement. In fact, “rules” that lack teeth actually risk legitimizing corrupt conduct.

This is all part of a larger issue, though. We didn’t end up with an ethics-averting Supreme Court by chance.

Out-of-touch ideologues have been spending decades stacking all levels of the federal judiciary with allies. Billionaires have been treating Supreme Court justices to secret gifts and lavish trips. And the Republican Party as a whole has been focusing on capturing the courts to enact unpopular agenda items that wouldn’t stand a chance at the ballot box.

That’s how they’ve ripped away the Constitutional right to an abortion, blocked student debt cancelation, shredded workers’ rights and voting rights, and made it easier to discriminate against LGBTQ+ people.

They didn’t get it done overnight, and we can’t unwind it overnight either. They had a plan. They put it into place. But I’ve got a plan, too — a plan for us to fight back and correct course:

In the shorter-term: President Biden has nominated (and our Democratic Senate has been confirming) a historically diverse slate of judicial nominees — including civil rights attorneys, legal aid lawyers, and public defenders. Getting more professional diversity on our courts is powerfully important, and something I’ve called for for a long time. I’ve also been pushing for an actually binding code of ethics for Supreme Court justices, with accountability mechanisms, because it’s clear that Congress must act if the Supreme Court won’t. And I’ve reintroduced my Judicial Ethics and Anti-Corruption Act, which would block off the special lanes of influence that powerful interests and billionaires have paved for themselves, ban federal judges from owning or trading individual stocks, and make Supreme Court Justices finally follow a basic and enforceable code of ethics.

For the longer-term: To rebalance a Supreme Court that’s been hijacked by extremists, we must expand it. I didn’t come to this conclusion lightly. But far-right justices keep substituting politics for the rule of law, and we must add more seats to rebalance this institution and restore its integrity. Additionally, we must fix the Electoral College so popular-vote losers like Donald Trump can’t stack the courts again. Remember: Five justices who ended the right to abortion were appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote.

Add your name if you agree with this plan: To undo the damage done by the right-wing takeover of our federal courts, we must continue to confirm more judges who respect the rule of law, root corruption out of the judiciary, and rebalance the Supreme Court by expanding it.

Thanks for being a part of this,

Elizabeth

P.S. At the same time as we’re working to reform the judiciary, we can also keep fighting to undo the damage that extremists have done through our courts. President Biden is moving forward on other routes to cancel student debt. And, we can continue fighting back at the local level, by supporting statewide ballot initiative campaigns to protect abortion rights. I’m staying in this fight.