Defeating the judicial coup

For the first six months of President Donald Trump’s second term in office, the will of the American people (through their elected president) has been obstructed by lower-court judges masquerading as fake little presidents in black robes. Thankfully, the Supreme Court is helping police its own branch, but more must be done – now, not later.

This problem was entirely predictable. Once the Left lost control of the White House, the Senate, the House of Representatives, and even the Supreme Court, few options remained for it to grasp onto remnants of power. Accordingly, the Left sought to reignite its few enduring leftist operators: lower-court judges.

There are too many instances to detail in this space, but consider just one of the most outrageous examples: Judge Royce Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia arrogantly ordered Trump to house men in women’s prisons, treat men as women, and provide men with women’s clothing to play dress-up in prison. Worse yet, he ordered that taxpayer dollars be used to fund prisoners’ sexual mutilations, and he required taxpayers to provide clothing and “modalities” for cross-dressing in federal prisons. The opinion arrogantly mandates even more outrageous items that should not be detailed in mixed company.

Checks and balances

The good news is that the authors of the U.S. Constitution anticipated that judges would abuse power; therefore, they built checks and balances into our system of government. For example, the courts do not create their own revenue. Congress has the “power of the purse” and, thereby, the ability to reduce the judicial budget. Constitutionally, Congress cannot reduce judicial salaries, but it can certainly freeze them; it can reduce the rest of the judicial budget by 10%, 20%, or even 100%.

Congress also has the power to impeach and remove judges for their judicial rulings. Some claim that Congress cannot, but it is a historical fact that Judge John Pickering, the very first member of the judiciary to be impeached and removed from the bench, was removed in 1803 for judicial activism (back then described as issuing judicial rulings “acts of Congress not regarding”). Removal of judges has a practical downside – the fact that it would require a two-thirds vote in the Senate.

Nevertheless, removal is still an appropriate constitutional remedy and should, therefore, be pursued.

A practical remedy

There are other, more practical remedies available, and it is time for Congress to use them. On April 10, the House of Representatives passed the No Rogue Judges Act of 2025 to limit court rulings to only the parties before the court. The Senate did not act on the bill, presumably because it would take 60 votes to defeat the Democrats’ filibuster, which would require seven Democrats to join the Republicans. Senators such as Mike Lee (R-UT) and Josh Hawley (R-MO) introduced other bills that are even better than the No Rogue Judges Act. However, all these proposals sit dormant because the filibuster prevents the will of the people.

There is nothing sacred nor constitutional about the filibuster; it is simply a Senate tradition, in the form of an internal rule that requires 60 votes – instead of a simple majority (normally 51 votes) – to proceed to pass legislation. The Senate has already abolished the filibuster for the confirmation of judges, and the world did not come to an end. In fact, it got a whole lot better. The time has now come to extend the abolition of the filibuster to legislation.

A leader in D.C. recently said that the abolition of the filibuster was “strong medicine.” He’s right, but considering the ailment – a judicial coup d’état – this medicine seems to be a timely and appropriate remedy for healing our nation.