Cut-Throat Supreme Court Goes Wild!

Recent actions by the nation’s highest court have earned them a new moniker: The Cut-Throat Supreme Court.

Top News Today :
Last week in a lead-up to the 4th of July holiday weekend, the Cut-Throat Supreme Court unleashed explosive fireworks that were not at all entertaining and left most of America reeling. Conservative justices (most of whom were appointed by Donald Trump) staged a One-Two-Three knock-out punch against minorities, gays, and student debtors that prompted Republicans to dance with delight in the “social media” streets.

Let’s take a look at the 3 major rulings the Cut-Throat Supreme Court delivered before packing their holiday picnic baskets and heading home.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION

Last week, the Cut-Throat Supreme Court killed affirmative action, effectively ending the long-standing tradition of balancing the ethnic makeup of America’s colleges and universities.

On Thursday, the six-justice conservative supermajority invalidated affirmative action admissions programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina. The ruling is expected to trickle down to other public and private colleges and eliminate race as one of many factors in deciding which of the qualified applicants should be admitted.

“Many universities have for too long…concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned but the color of their skin,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote. “Our constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.”

However, activists immediately challenged the ruling and said that if the court truly wanted to make college admission exclusively merit-based, they should have targeted legacy admissions at Harvard and other Ivy League schools instead of affirmative action (Legacy admissions programs grant automatic admission to children of wealthy alumni members).

“Why are we rewarding children for privileges and advantages accrued by prior generations?” said Ivan Espinoza-Madrigal, the executive director of Lawyers for Civil Rights, who believes legacy admissions violate the Civil Rights Act. “Your family’s last name and the size of your bank account are not a measure of merit, and should have no bearing on the college admissions process.”

STUDENT LOAN FORGIVENESS

For decades, students have followed the American dream of going to college to make a better life for themselves as adults. For decades, students have borrowed tens of thousands of dollars to make that dream come true — only to realize later that their eventual work salaries weren’t always enough to pay back the loans.  

Many former students entered into payment plans that quickly became an unending cycle since their payments often went to interest and not the actual loan. The result meant former students were forced to repay loans for decades (or else forfeit their tax refunds and ruin their credit report), even though their years of payments only put a dent in the actual amount owed.

President Biden promised to help by creating the Student Loan Forgiveness Program, which would have wiped away up to $20,000 in loans and penalties for millions of Americans making under $125,000 per year.

Despite the program having zero negative effects against its residents, the conservative states of Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Carolina took their case all the way to the Supreme Court and sued to halt loan forgiveness. Although the lawsuit seemed more political in nature (in an effort to prevent President Biden from winning a feather in his cap prior to the 2024 election), the Cut-Throat Supreme Court ruled in favor of the lawsuit, sided with the conservative states, and slapped former students in the face by denying their desire to get out from under drowning student loan debt.

“You go to college to try to get ahead in life, and instead it’s like being shackled,” former student Amanda Fortunato, 32, said. “Millennials are the first generation expected to be worse off than their parents. It’s no secret the reason why.

“It feels like the system went so far out of its way to shoot down something that would help middle-class Americans,” Fortunato added. “If we don’t find a solution, the bell will toll eventually for student loans and at some point the entire economy will feel its impact.”

DISCRIMINATION

Despite a state law forbidding discrimination against gay people, a Colorado woman claimed she had the right to refuse to provide her website design services to a same-sex couple.

Last week, the Cut-Throat Supreme Court ruled that the woman was right — and that she and others like her may continue to discriminate.

In a contentious 6-3 ruling led by the mostly conservative/religious/MAGA justices, the court turned the clock back to 1952 and created the precedent that discrimination against gays is once again permissible in America. Particularly, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote on behalf of the majority that the First Amendment protected designer Lorie Smith and her 303 Creative business from being compelled to build a website for a gay couple because she is an evangelical Christian.

Interestingly, the court once ruled in favor of a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a couple because they were gay.

“A website designer could equally refuse to create a wedding website for an interracial couple, for example,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote on behalf of the minority. “How quickly we forget that opposition to interracial marriage was often because ‘Almighty God . . . did not intend for the races to mix,’” she said, quoting Loving v. Virginia, the 1976 landmark case that overturned state-level bans on interracial marriage. 

Although federal law has long prevented businesses from denying service to anyone based on disability, race, color, religion, sexual orientation, gender, or national origin, the Cut-Throat Supreme Court apparently believes that law is moot.

Now, members of the aforementioned groups are wondering how long it will take before the ruling will give the green light for businesses to discriminate against them, too.

Last year, the Cut-Throat Supreme Court launched its Republican/conservative “Hit List” by extinguishing Roe v. Wade and ending a woman’s right to choose. This year, the court dismantled affirmative action, killed President Biden’s student loan forgiveness program, and created the precedent to make discrimination (for now, against gays) legal and acceptable.

It looks like the hits just keep coming — and Republicans are loving every minute of it. Is a return to the days of Jim Crow next?

OK WASSUP! discusses the Top News Today:
The Cut-Throat Supreme Court has a field day.