Trump-nominated Justice Amy Coney Barrett surprises court watchers with independent streak

When reflecting on his four years in the White House, former President Donald Trump often points proudly to his three successful nominations to the U.S. Supreme Court.

However, as subsequent court terms have unfolded, one of Trump's judicial selections, namely Justice Amy Coney Barrett, has surprised legal observers with her fiercely independent streak and regular willingness to diverge from the conservative wing of the panel, as the Reflector's Bobby Burns suggests.

Barrett emerges as independent voice

Though her nomination by Trump and eventual confirmation for a spot on the high court prompted cries of outrage and loathing from liberals everywhere, the manner in which Barrett has gone about the business of the court has left a number of liberal-leaning commentators feeling pleasantly surprised.

Out of the three justices chosen for the high court by former President Trump, Barrett has gained a reputation as the “most independent minded,” according to Burns.

“She is no Sandra Day O'Connor, at least not yet,” Burns wrote, “but she is following the late O'Connor's playbook in her willingness to occasionally work with the other side, namely the three liberal justices on the Court, and to embrace gender solidarity.”

The reference to O'Connor, Burns notes, has to do with the fact that the late jurist's own sense of independence on the bench “made her a force to be reckoned with on a closely divided 5 to 4 Court, where her vote made the difference. Both sides would court her, and she used her power to shape compromises that would accommodate the vast middle of public opinion on contentious issues like abortion and affirmative action.”

While Burns suggested that “Justice Barrett's shift to the center is minimal by comparison,” it has nevertheless sparked concerns among conservatives that she is “in danger of 'flipping'” over the course of the presumed decades she has still to serve on the high court.

Pundits weigh in

Writing for The Week, Joel Mathis laments Barrett's role in the reversal of the abortion precedent in Roe v. Wade, but also cites Axios for the proposition that the justice is also “beginning to separate herself from the [conservative] pack in important ways.”

Mathis noted approvingly that, also according to Axios Barrett's “positions on Donald Trump's court cases were 'significantly less favorable' to the former president than other GOP appointees” and added that in the court's most recent term, “she wrote concurring opinions 'questioning and honing the majority's methods' while occasionally joining liberal justices in 'notable dissents... .'”

Stephen Vladeck of the New York Times joined in Mathis' tempered praise of Barrett, saying that she “has found her voice -- and has easily become the most interesting justice” and that she routinely produces “principled, nuanced and fair-minded” writings.

Arguing the other side, however, was Kimberly Atkins Stohr of the Boston Globe, who observed, “Justice Barrett may show streaks of independence, but when it counts, she's as conservative as they come.”

She went on to contend that in most cases, Barrett is keeping faith with the ideals of those who helped catapult her to the Supreme Court, suggesting that “her resistance only comes when she's not deciding a vote,” but whether the justice's overall performance will, on balance, be something Trump is ultimately pleased to have facilitated, only time will tell.