judge gavel
CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin has never been one to show good judgement. When he's not getting caught conducting "personal business" on a staff Zoom call, he's accidentally admitting that there's an ongoing leftist-led judicial coup designed to stymie President Trump's agenda.

The serial self-pleasurer let the proverbial cat out of the bag in his Monday opinion column for The New York Times. Titled, "The Plan for a Radically Different Supreme Court Is Here," the article purports to roll out a blueprint for countering conservative appointments of originalist judges to the bench but inadvertently discloses the existence of leftists' efforts to weaponize the judicial system against Trump.

The admission comes in the piece's opening paragraphs, in which Toobin discusses the American Constitution Society and its new president, Phil Brest. The ACS has often been described as the less successful and left-wing alternative to the conservative Federalist Society, which has become an influential force in getting originalists appointed to the Supreme Court and other federal judgeships.

Phil Brest American Constitution Society
© ACSPhil Brest, president of the left-wing American Constitution Society
Toobin notes how Brest — who worked in the Biden White House's counsel office — "helped the president nominate and win confirmation of 235 federal judges, which is more than Mr. Trump's total in his first term." In the very next sentence, however, the CNN legal analyst let it slip that these judicial appointments have become the left's primary tool in grinding Trump and his voters' agenda to a halt.

"Those [Biden] judges — and others appointed by Democratic presidents — have proved that the most effective resistance to Mr. Trump has come not from Democratic politicians but rather from federal judges," wrote Toobin, who subsequently listed off a series of overreaching orders issued by "these judges, many of them Biden appointees," against the 47th president.

Toobin goes on to lament how the ACS has not boasted the same level of success as groups like The Federalist Society and has failed to advance an alternative style of judicial interpretation to originalism, which emphasizes the interpretation of the Constitution as written at the time of its adoption. Once again, the CNN legal analyst openly admits that — contrary to the article's headline — the ACS doesn't actually have a different philosophy or "plan" in mind, and that the group's only strategy at the moment is appointing activist judges who will abuse their authority to stonewall Republican presidents.

"For now, under Mr. Brest, the A.C.S. seems headed for an approach that looks like the one that Democratic politicians have so far adopted: aimed more at opposition to Mr. Trump's record rather than on a specific, alternative vision for the Constitution. In his opening message to the group, Mr. Brest described the A.C.S. as building 'a bulwark against overreach by the Trump administration and the Roberts court,'" Toobin wrote. "Mr. Brest has pledged that A.C.S. will continue its Biden-era focus on judicial appointments ... As for what those judges will stand for — as opposed to what they stand against — Mr. Brest has no clear answer."

What Toobin's article encapsulates is the left's ongoing struggle session about how best to lie to the American people about the kinds of legal minds they want to appoint to the bench and their blatant disregard for proper separation of powers.

The entire reason for the modern originalist movement's foundation and ultimate success is because of past Supreme Courts' embrace of living constitutionalism, a style of judicial interpretation in which judges treat the Constitution as a "living" document that magically evolves with the times. It is through this philosophy that judges take it upon themselves to act as legislators and effectively rewrite America's founding document as they see fit.

Whereas living constitutionalism takes away the people and their elected representatives' lawmaking power and hands it to unelected lawyers in black robes, originalism delivers the opposite — a maintaining of separation of powers in which Americans hold the exclusive power to amend the Constitution.

In many cases, the current Supreme Court has adopted the latter approach instead of the former and has rolled back much of the activism of past Supreme Courts. With this avenue of power no longer available to them and the legislative and executive branches under Republican control, leftists have turned to their last available option: the lower courts.

As admitted by Toobin, Democrat-appointed district judges have become a critical feature of the left's evolving lawfare against Trump and those who support him. In response to leftist-backed lawsuits, these judges have spent the past year issuing overreaching injunctions and temporary restraining orders blocking every aspect of the president's agenda — with some even going as far as attempting to unilaterally halt enactment of policies passed by Congress.

While the Supreme Court has limited some of these actions, loopholes in the high court's 2025 ruling on lower courts' abuse of nationwide injunctions have continued to be exploited by rogue judges. The GOP Congress and Trump have also declined to take necessary action to stop this weaponization of the judicial system.

The Times and Toobin may think the latter's article is shining a light on a new and exciting counter to the successful originalist movement. In reality, it's just further affirmation of the left's willingness to wreck America's constitutional system in their quest for unfettered power.