"Not at all. No, I mean, he wants another one. That's OK. He can have another one. No, I don't think it undermines — like, I think — look what happened after the Dobbs decision, members of Congress, the administration came out basically threatening judges for months on end."
On Monday, September 14, 2026, the Supreme Court denied the administration's application to let the U.S. Postal Service implement parts of its rule carrying out Trump's March executive order on mail-in voting. In a brief unsigned order the justices left in place a preliminary injunction from Judge Indira Talwani in Boston, who had found the Postal Service likely has no authority to control mail-in voting. The blocked requirements would have made states submit voter names and addresses into a USPS portal and print specific barcodes on ballot envelopes as a condition of delivery. The Court said the administration was unlikely to succeed on the merits. Justice Kavanaugh wrote separately on the impossibility of state and local officials implementing the changes before the election. Justices Alito and Thomas dissented. None of the three justices Trump appointed in his first term — Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett — noted disagreement with the majority. On Tuesday, September 15, Trump posted the statement above to Truth Social, adding that the Court was "bullied and cajoled by the Radical Left," that its decisions had set America back "at least a hundred years," and that "It is not easy for me to write this... it will likely cost me dearly for years to come - but I feel it my obligation and duty, as President, to do so for the America we love!" That afternoon Attorney General Todd Blanche briefed reporters in the Rose Garden. Asked whether the ruling obstructs future ballot-fraud prosecutions, he said: "The Supreme Court's decision today, or yesterday, doesn't affect ongoing criminal investigations into illegal voting, no." Asked whether the department would suspend its attempt to establish federal mail-ballot standards for the 2026 cycle, he said: "Of course, we're going to comply with the Supreme Court's decision, as we always do. That doesn't mean that we're not going to do everything in this administration that we can to make sure that there are free and fair elections," and added: "part of the decision was the timing and that we ran out of time because of the litigation, in part. And so our efforts... are not going to stop, um, just in November or after - or thereafter." He said "I am also upset about the Supreme Court decision." Asked what role Americans should expect the Justice Department to take in the midterms, he said: "The federal government is always involved in elections. That's not new to this administration, it's not new to the Biden administration." Asked, in a follow-up, whether the president's comments about his own appointees undermine even the perception of the Court's independence, he gave the answer above. There is no vacancy on the Supreme Court.
Ran the loss and the tantrum. "Supreme Court rejects Trump mail-in voting restrictions" on Monday, "Trump unloads on Supreme Court justices" on Tuesday, and Newsweek assembled the timeline of every previous time he has criticized his own appointees. The Attorney General's briefing was covered for two things: his AI answer and his comments on the media ban. The exchange about judicial independence was not covered anywhere. A reporter asked the chief law enforcement officer of the United States whether the president publicly calling three sitting justices "a shell of their original selves" damages the perception that the Court is independent. His answer began with a denial, and then, unprompted, produced a sentence about a vacancy that does not exist: he wants another one, that's OK, he can have another one. Nobody followed up. Nobody asked which seat, or what "he can have another one" is a prediction about, or on what basis the officer who would vet that nominee says it casually from a podium three days after the Court ruled against him. The rest of the briefing was reported as routine, and the most revealing sentence in it was not transcribed into a single story.
Entry #46 recorded the first half of this: the Supreme Court called the USPS rule hypothetical on a Monday when it had already issued at 9 p.m. the previous Friday, and the order never mentioned it. That procedural gap is what produced the August 24 stay, what produced Judge Talwani's second order three days later, and what the Court finally closed on September 14 — and the reason it gave, that there is no longer time to implement before November, is the reason the Attorney General then cited as proof the effort was defeated by delay rather than by law: "we ran out of time because of the litigation." The consequence is stated plainly and was not reported: the effort does not stop in November or thereafter. Two things sit in the record now that were not there before. The Department of Justice has said, from a White House podium, that a rule the Supreme Court blocked as likely unlawful will continue to be pursued past the election it was aimed at, while criminal investigations into voting proceed unaffected. And the Attorney General, asked about the independence of the Court, volunteered that the president wants another justice and can have one. Neither statement is unlawful. Neither was contested at the podium. Both are on video, and the video of the second one has been watched by almost no one.