Jackson defends controversial, fiery SCOTUS dissents as telling people ‘how I feel’

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson reflected on her role on the Supreme Court during an event in Louisiana over the weekend, saying she enjoyed making her opinion known through court cases.

“I just feel that I have a wonderful opportunity to tell people in my opinions how I feel about the issues, and that’s what I try to do,” Jackson said.

Jackson, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, made the remarks during a sit-down with ABC News on stage during the Essence Festival of Culture in New Orleans as part of a tour for her book, “Lovely One.”

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Despite being the most junior justice, Jackson has made her voice heard in the high court by going out of her way to write her own dissents in high-profile cases, even if she is not the principal dissenter, as she did in a recent major decision in which the Supreme Court found universal injunctions from judges were unlawful.

“I write separately to emphasize a key conceptual point: The Court’s decision to permit the Executive to violate the Constitution with respect to anyone who has not yet sued is an existential threat to the rule of law,” Jackson wrote in defense of universal injunctions.

In a biting rebuke, Justice Amy Coney Barrett responded in her majority opinion that Jackson’s remarks were “at odds” with more than 200 years of court precedent and the Constitution and that they were not worth dwelling on.

Recently, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a liberal justice who often sides with Jackson in prominent cases, went out of her way to disagree with Jackson in an emergency order that permitted President Donald Trump’s sweeping federal job cuts.

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Jackson indicated during the interview that the justices have good relationships with one another. She noted that they have a ritual by which they shake each other’s hands before walking out into the courtroom and that some also have lunch together weekly.

“The rule at lunch is that you don’t talk about cases, so you learn about people’s families and sports and books and movies and that kind of thing, and you get to know them outside of work,” Jackson said.

Jackson, a Harvard Law School graduate and former federal judge, has also attracted attention for how frequently she chimes in during oral arguments. Analyses by the Empirical SCOTUS blog found Jackson spoke more than any of her colleagues during arguments in the 2022 and 2023 court terms.

“It’s funny to me how people focus on how much I talk at oral argument,” Jackson said during the interview.

“I was always this person on the bench,” Jackson said. “And so it’s been a bit of an adjustment, because, as a trial court judge, you have your own courtroom, so you can go on as long as you want. And, so, trying to make sure that my colleagues get to ask some questions has been a challenge for me, but I’ve enjoyed it. I really have.”