SC Justice urges judges to maintain 'fierce independence' amid Trump's tensions with courts

US Supreme Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor has said that judges should be “fiercely independent” to deal with the growing challenges to the rule of law.

Speaking to students at Georgetown University on Friday, Sotomayor said that judges need to “ensure that the state is respectful” of judicial independence and Constitutional rights.

Sotomayor did not reference President Donald Trump or his criticisms of judges who ruled against him in some of the over 175 lawsuits challenging his executive orders. However, liberal justice expressed concern about the nation’s apparent decline in “common norms,” which she emphasized were essential for a functioning justice system.

She said, “Once we lose our common norms, we’ve lost the rule of law completely.”

Yesterday, US President Donald Trump asked the apex court to allow his administration to continue deporting alleged Venezuelan gang members without a court hearing. The president claims he has the authority under a 1798 law that has historically been used only during wartime. Deportations have been paused since March 15, when the administration sent two planes of migrants to a prison in El Salvador, despite a judge’s verbal order for the planes to return.

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Trump and his aides have consistently criticized judges for blocking aspects of his extensive agenda. Earlier this month, the president took to social media to label the judge in the deportation case a “Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator,” and called for their impeachment.