Justice Jackson accuses Supreme Court of manipulating procedures to favor President Trump: "The system's no longer fair.
On Friday, the Supreme Court issued a short order allowing the Department of Government Efficiency — a somewhat mysterious White House agency formerly headed by billionaire Elon Musk — to access a broad array of sensitive information maintained by the Social Security Administration. This includes access to personal banking details and medical records. All three Democratic justices dissented from the ruling in Social Security Administration v. AFSCME.
Realistically, the Trump administration was always expected to win this case. As Solicitor General D. John Sauer stated in the administration’s brief, the plaintiffs in AFSCME “do not contend that their information has been shared with parties outside the government.” The case, at its core, is about whether courts have any authority to second-guess the executive branch when it comes to decisions on which federal employees are permitted to access government-held data. Typically, decisions of this nature — internal management issues — are beyond judicial review.
While the outcome itself may not come as a shock, the case reveals deeper divisions within the Supreme Court and sheds light on how the Trump administration has successfully bypassed traditional legal procedures to fast-track its appeals before an increasingly favorable bench. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s dissent centered heavily on concerns about how quickly the Court responds to Trump-related cases. She wrote that her Republican colleagues appear to have “abandoned an important limit on the Court’s authority” — particularly when the Trump administration is the party requesting expedited review. The AFSCME matter emerged through the Court’s so-called “shadow docket,” which includes emergency motions and other cases handled without full briefing or oral argument. Before Trump’s presidency, these types of emergency appeals were rarely granted. In fact, both the Bush and Obama administrations sought such expedited action only about once every two years due to strict procedural expectations.
That precedent was disrupted when Donald Trump entered office. His legal team now regularly approaches the Court to intervene immediately after lower courts constrain their actions — and the justices often comply, even if it means overturning decisions without full deliberation. These rulings are often handed down with no elaboration, typically over the objections of the Democratic minority on the bench. Yet there are supposed to be constraints on when the Court can step in early. As Justice Jackson pointed out in her dissent, for the government to win a stay from the Supreme Court, it must demonstrate “that it will actually suffer concrete or irreparable harm from having to comply with the District Court’s order.” This principle, she argues, has been quietly cast aside.
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