The Supreme Court’s bleak October term served Trump, not America

The Supreme Court is, without question, a political court. The October 2025 term just ended proves it beyond any doubt. 

Conservative law Professor William Baude, conceding that Trump’s abuse of power is “outrageous,” argues the court is no rubber stamp. He says it’s hard to recall when “a court with six members appointed by the president’s party and three of his own appointees ruled against him on at least three different things he seemed to care a lot about in one term,” referring to the birthright citizenship, tariffs and voting by mail cases. 

Legal commentator Elie Honig argued in Café last week that some of this term’s 6-3 or 7-2 decisions are attributable more to differences in judicial methodology than to politics. His argument cites the National Guard and Mifepristone as cases which went against Trump (at least, on a temporary basis), glosses over the asylum and Temporary Protected Status cases and ignores the Voting Rights Act, campaign finance and defeated claims of transgender athletes, cases Trump is happy about.

But liberal law professor Stephen Vladeck analogizes the rare swivels of the court’s conservative majority to “the arsonist who shows up with a fire extinguisher.” Vladeck concludes that the term just ended was “bleak,” and I agree with him. 

The October 2025 term was about as supremely partisan as they come. Vladeck noted in a social media post that there were 20 total rulings in cases argued this term that split the court 5-4 or 6-3, and the Democratic appointees were all on the same side in 19 of them. 

True, some of the court’s biggest rulings of the term........

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