The Dam Is Breaking on Democrats Embracing Supreme Court Expansion

A slew of decisions that are terrible for democracy might have lit a fire under some of the most powerful Democrats. I got them to say that they'll do something about it.

This was the week the Supreme Court broke. The cracks were showing for a long time, but after the latest run of mind-blowing rulings – including giving Trump sweeping authority to fire regulators, teeing up the deportation of thousands of people back to war-ravaged countries, and all but obliterating campaign spending rules – the court has completely abandoned its purpose, a commitment above all to the Constitution.

The takeaway here: this is all the proof we need that Supreme Court expansion is beyond necessary. The fact that you have three to four justices (depending on how you read Kavanaugh’s flaccid argument) on the record saying that the Constitution does not apply in the case of upholding birthright citizenship should be a flashing red light to anyone watching. Birthright citizenship - which is affirmed in the plain text of the Constitution - barely survived this session. And I’d venture to guess that what’s left of our voting rights will have an even slimmer chance of making it out of the 2027 session alive.

As far as this court is concerned, we’re no longer in a position to “hope for the best,” to watch and wait for things to turn out alright. We have to act.

Interestingly, this came up in a conversation with Governor Gavin Newsom about my new book, The Day After, on his podcast. Newsom and I have disagreed about Supreme Court expansion. But in a discussion about my book, which is literally a blueprint for how Democrats should wield power in a post-Trump world, I got Newsom to agree with me for the first time on how to wield it.

“I’m with you. I’m done winning arguments, we gotta win.”

If and when Democrats retake control of the government (already a Herculean feat unto itself) and manage to pass progressive legislation (another Herculean feat), all of it will be rendered completely moot by a court that’s guaranteed to strike down everything that doesn’t comport with its political ideology. We have to decide if we want to win symbolic victories and simply get caught trying or if we actually want to make permanent, meaningful change. If it’s the latter, then inherently, that requires us to expand the Court. 

Now, this isn’t the only conversation taking place about this. Sen. Adam Schiff appeared on CNN and said, in response to my discussion with Newsom, that he agrees with me that the Court should be expanded and reformed.

But he makes a crucial point here; it’s not enough for Democrats to institute term limits for justices or get into the weeds on ethics reforms, because all of it goes before an existing Supreme Court that will always rule in its own self interest. So unless Democrats expand the court – and Schiff argues for that to be to 13 – none of this matters.

This is exactly what I lay out in my book, The Day After. It’s what I’m going to talk about the most and the loudest while I’m on my book tour. And now we have two of the most powerful Democrats in the government, including one who’s a likely 2028 presidential candidate, joining the discourse and beating the drum for expanding the court.

This is exactly what the book was meant to do: push Democrats to fight harder to make real material change, and to fix what’s been broken. And now, in conversations about the book, I’m pushing Democrats to fight harder, and they’re agreeing to get into the fight. It’s a testament to how effective this book could be. So, immodestly, I will ask that you not only pre-order a copy and grab tickets to my book tour in NY, DC, and LA (both of which can be found here) but tell people about it. The more books we sell, the more attention it gets, and that’s how this conversation spreads and these ideas pick up steam. Courage can be contagious, but it has to start somewhere.

We have the opportunity to take back control of Congress in the midterms, and I believe we can do it. But once we do, we have to be ready to get to work. This is the instruction manual for how to do it when the time comes.