Dan Abrams Calls Out Schumer, Trump for Personal Attacks on Judges: They ‘Undermine Our Faith in the Rule of Law’
ABC News chief legal analyst and Mediaite founder Dan Abrams called out the inflammatory rhetoric aimed at federal judges from both Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and President Donald Trump, warning that such personal attacks “undermine our faith in the rule of law.”
Appearing on CNN’s Cuomo Prime Time, Abrams reacted to Schumer’s recent comments about Supreme Court Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, where the New York senator appeared to physically threaten them — using language like “pay the price” and “won’t know what hit you” — if they were to rule against abortion rights in an upcoming case. Schumer’s rhetoric ignited a furious pushback, including from Chief Justice John Roberts himself, and the senator has since walked it back and acknowledged: “I shouldn’t have used the words I did.”
“First of all, it was a huge mistake,” Abrams told host Chris Cuomo. “He should be criticized. He should be condemned for it. This is exactly what we shouldn’t be doing. Also, the disrespect with which he treated the justices. He didn’t refer to them by their formal names of justice, just their last names…
“Gorsuch and Kavanaugh!” Cuomo cut in, impersonating Schumer’s angry tone.
“The bottom line is, there should be respect for the justices of the Supreme Court,” Abrams insisted.
“You don’t have to like the decision. You don’t have to respect the decision in terms of on the merits. You must respect its enforcement,” Cuomo said.
“Criticize the opinions, criticize the reasoning, criticize the ruling: all fair game,” Abrams added. “That’s very different than making it personal to the justices. [Schumer] initially claimed, ‘Well, obviously that’s not what I meant.’ That’s sure what it sounded like what he was saying.”
“Didn’t apologize. Didn’t say ‘I was wrong.’ He said ‘I didn’t use the right words.’ He gave a political answer,” Cuomo noted of Schumer’s non-apology apology. “Now talk about playing politics with the same thing. The president comes out: ‘If a Republican did this, they would be in jail.’ He does it all the time. He did it about two justices by name the week before.”
“Look, I think it’s different for him to say that justices should recuse themselves. I don’t think that’s comparable to what Schumer did. I think what Schumer did is worse. But…” Abrams argued. “I think what the president has done with other judges, is worse than what Schumer said.”
Abrams then alluded to Trump’s vicious 2016 smearing of a Mexican-American judge, who the then-candidate blasted as biased against a plan for a U.S.-Mexico border wall because of his heritage. Those comments were roundly denounced as bigoted and even then-Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) condemned them as a “textbook definition of a racist comment.”
“So we have to provide context here,” Abrams reminded viewers. “And the point is, all of these attacks on judges, the personal attacks, not on the ruling, not on the reasoning, undermine our faith in the rule of law. That’s why justice Roberts last time came out and said ‘We don’t have Obama judges.’ I was glad he did it.”
Watch the video above, via CNN.
