By Andrew Chung
NEW YORK (Reuters) -Conservative Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett rejected on Thursday the notion of a U.S. constitutional crisis as President Donald Trump’s far-reaching executive actions test legal boundaries and spark tension with the judiciary.
Amid hundreds of legal challenges, federal judges have frequently blocked or slowed numerous Trump policies, provoking harsh criticism from the president and his allies.
In March, Trump urged the impeachment of a judge hearing a deportation dispute, and at times legal scholars questioned whether his administration’s pushback against judicial orders amounted to outright defiance.
“I don’t think that we are currently in a constitutional crisis,” Barrett told listeners at New York’s Lincoln Center, adding that, in her view, a crisis would occur if the rule of law crumbled, but that the constitution was alive and well.
The remarks came at one of numerous public appearances planned this month tied to her new book, “Listening To The Law,” set for release on September 9.
“I think that our country remains committed to the rule of law. I think we have functioning courts,” Barrett told journalist Bari Weiss, founder of online publication the Free Press in an interview on stage.
Trump appointed Barrett to the court in 2020, solidifying its current 6-3 conservative majority.
Since he retook office in January, Trump has taken numerous unilateral actions to reshape the federal government, crack down on immigration, end diversity programs and impose sweeping tariffs on trading partners.
“Right now we’re in a time of passionate disagreement in America,” Barrett said. “But we have been in times of passionate disagreement before.”
Since Barrett joined the nine-member court, it has rapidly shifted American law to the right, ending the constitutional right to abortion, widening gun rights, expanding religious rights and rejecting race-conscious university admissions.
Barrett, who joined the court in 2020 after the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a strong supporter of abortion rights, defended her 2022 vote to overturn the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that recognized a constitutional right to abortion.
Polls show that the share of Americans who support abortion rights has grown over the last decade. In a 2024 Reuters/Ipsos poll, some 57% of respondents said abortion should be legal in all or most cases, up from 46% in 2014.
“It’s pretty risky to take public opinion into account when you’re deciding cases,” Barrett said.
The 2022 decision led to a dramatic change in abortion access for millions of women, with 18 U.S. states adopting near-total bans or bans at an early stage of pregnancy, says the Guttmacher Institute, an abortion rights research group.
(Reporting by Andrew Chung; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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