Supreme Court’s ‘Nostalgia Doctrine’ Is Trump’s Biggest Legacy
In 2022, the conservative justices made it clear that they were guided by self-serving pseudo-history, not principle or precedent.
The Trump court.
Photographer: Bloomberg2022 turned out to be the most consequential year of Donald Trump’s presidency. This year, the Supreme Court proved that its hard-right turn will be the most enduring legacy of his sorry four years in office.
Trump’s three Supreme Court appointments — a lot for any one-term president, thanks to Mitch McConnell holding Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat open for Justice Neil Gorsuch — have launched a conservative judicial revolution that has only begun to repeal many of the major constitutional advances of the last 50-plus years. The new conservative majority is issuing decisions geared at restoring a nostalgic, never-was version of constitutional history, in place of long-established precedent.