'The biggest judicial power grab since 1803'

The US Supreme Court in Washington, DC, US

(Image credit: Kent Nishimura / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

published 19 January 2024

'Conservative justices made clear they're about to gut the federal government's power to regulate'

Elie Mystal in The Nation

The Supreme Court aims to "pull off the biggest judicial power grab" since it made itself "the final arbiter of the Constitution" in 1803's Marbury v. Madison, argues Elie Mystal in The Nation. The conservative majority is poised to dismantle the Chevron deference — "the idea that courts should defer to executive agencies when applying regulations passed by Congress." This would put justices' "unaccountable policy preferences" over those of lawmakers and presidents — "power nobody elected them to have."

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.