The U.S. Supreme Court, on April 9, 2026. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)
U.S. House Republicans on Thursday denounced expanding the Supreme Court, an idea some Democrats support to dilute the court’s conservative majority after years of decisions that have angered liberals.
Republican and Democratic lawmakers at a hearing clashed over the future of the high court following Louisiana v. Callais, a landmark decision gutting the federal Voting Rights Act.
The ruling cleared the way for GOP-controlled Southern states to eliminate congressional districts held by Black Democrats ahead of the November midterm elections.
Democrats have responded by renewing calls for changing the Supreme Court, including expanding the number of justices beyond the nine currently serving. Thursday’s hearing offered a preview of how Republicans may attack those plans if Democrats retake the House in November and try to advance a court overhaul through the chamber.
“Will the United States Congress side with the idea that we should be more democratic in our third branch, or that our third branch should remain more independent, less if not completely outside” the will of the people at the moment, said Rep. Darrell Issa, a California Republican who chairs the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, Artificial Intelligence, and the Internet.
‘Court packing’
The subcommittee hearing, officially titled “Court Packing: A Threat to the Supreme Court’s Legitimacy,” centered on Republican warnings that adding justices would create a slippery slope with no clear end. Democrats countered that the court is placing democracy at risk.
It’s not clear a bill to expand the court would pass a Democratic-controlled House. No clear consensus exists among Democrats over exactly what changes should be made, and other ideas include term limits for justices, a mandatory ethics code for the court or limiting the kind of cases the court can take.
Any overhaul would face a steep path to becoming law in the near term because of the Senate filibuster and President Donald Trump’s veto.
But Democrats are broadly furious with the Supreme Court and support is growing for some form of action.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris last week called for a discussion of Supreme Court reform, including expanding the court. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, a New York Democrat set to become speaker if his party retakes the chamber, has said “something” must be done in the next Congress.
“Our nation is now in Jim Crow 2.0,” Rep. Henry “Hank” Johnson, a Georgia Democrat and the subcommittee’s ranking member, said at the hearing.
Ruling that sparked outrage
In Callais, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that Louisiana had enacted an unconstitutional racial gerrymander when it drew a second majority-Black congressional district.
The opinion sharply limits the use of race in redistricting, allowing states for partisan gain to split apart districts where most residents belong to a racial minority group. The Voting Rights Act had previously protected these districts.
Democrats have been outraged by other major decisions as well.
The Citizens United case in 2010 dramatically expanded the role of corporate money in politics. Dobbs in 2022 ended the federal right to abortion. And in 2024, Trump v. United States gave the president sweeping immunity from criminal prosecution for actions taken while in office.
“We can either sit back as our Supreme Court continues to act without any restraint or checks and balances, or we can do something about it,” Johnson said.
Republicans say they’ve also lost
Republicans and witnesses called by GOP lawmakers emphasized that the Supreme Court has also ruled against conservatives in a number of high-profile cases.
For example, Chief Justice John Roberts cast the decisive vote to uphold the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act, President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare law. The Supreme Court also guaranteed the right to same-sex marriage in 2015 and bolstered employment protections for gay and transgender workers in 2019.
More recently, the Supreme Court effectively blocked Trump’s deployments of the National Guard into Democratic cities. And in February, the justices struck down Trump’s global tariffs — his signature trade policy.
“We had a terrible tariff decision. They cost our country a fortune,” Trump said Thursday.
Gene Schaerr, a lawyer who has argued in front of the Supreme Court, suggested that if Democrats add justices, Republicans will almost certainly respond.
“Before long the only venue in Washington, D.C., that will be large enough to accommodate the Supreme Court’s conferences, their private conferences, will be the White House ballroom,” Schaerr told the subcommittee.
Merrick Garland nomination
But Republicans have already engaged in court packing, said Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat and the ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee.
When Justice Antonin Scalia died in February 2016, Senate Republicans led by then-Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky blocked consideration of Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland. After Trump won the 2016 election, the Senate moved swiftly to confirm his nominee, Neil Gorsuch, in early 2017.
Senate Republicans then quickly confirmed Trump nominee Amy Coney Barrett after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in September 2020 — despite the vacancy occurring much closer to the election than in 2016. Those decisions helped move a 5-4 court at the end of the Obama era to a 6-3 conservative majority.
“So right there we have two seats officially stolen by Mitch McConnell and the Republican Senate,” Raskin said.
On Thursday, Republicans cast Democratic attacks on the Supreme Court’s legitimacy as dangerous. The court relies on respect, Missouri Solicitor General Louis Capozzi said, with the norm of an independent judiciary built over time.
“Today, we take it for granted that government officials will follow the Supreme Court’s orders,” said Capozzi, who previously clerked for Gorsuch. “But that could change if politicians interfere with the Supreme Court’s independence.”
