The president of the court, John Roberts, emphasized the importance of an independent judiciary on Wednesday in the comments delivered at a time when Trump administration officials often criticize the courts that have blocked their policies.
Roberts, speaking in a public event in Buffalo, New York, said that an independent judiciary is a key characteristic of the constitutional system of the United States that had not existed in other countries when it was founded.
“In our Constitution … the Judiciary is a coefficient branch of the government, separated from others, with the authority to interpret the Constitution as law and demonstrate, obviously, acts of the congress or acts of the president,” he said.
“And that innovation does not work if … the judiciary is not independent,” he added. “His work is, obviously, to decide the cases but, in the course of that, to verify the excesses of the Congress or the Executive, and that requires a certain degree of independence.”
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Roberts, who answered a question by the American district judge, Lawrence Vilardo, did not specifically addressed President Donald Trump, and his comments were mild compared to the blunt comments, the liberal judge Ketanji Brown Jackson made last week.
Vilardo also asked Roberts about Trump’s calls and his allies to accuse the judges who have ruled against the administration.
Roberts pointed out a statement he had issued on the subject and gave no more details.
“Well, I’ve talked to that. You know, the accusation is not how you register disagreement with decisions,” Roberts said.
Referring to the cases of the Supreme Court in the appeal, Vilardo said: “For that you are, right?”
“That’s what we are there,” Roberts replied.
Last year, Roberts wrote the majority opinion when the court ruled that Trump had some immunity for criminal prosecution for acts taken during his first term in a decision that promoted Trump’s re -election offer.
The court listens to oral arguments next week about Trump’s effort to end constitutional right to citizenship of law to birth for any person born in the United States.
Roberts, a conservative appointed by President George W. Bush in 2005, was in Buffalo to commemorate the 125th anniversary of the United States District Court for the West District of New York.
He spent his first years in Buffalo, he said, but after moving to Indiana, he changed his loyalty from the Buffalo Bills to the Chicago Bears. That admission led some audience boos on Wednesday.
