With “little fanfare,” the Supreme Court is quietly working to double its own police force, Politico’s Josh Gerstein reported on Sunday, a push that justices and court officials apparently “loathe” discussing.
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“The push for a rapid security buildout stems from the substantial threats to the justices at a moment of growing political violence in the U.S. and the sense that the system has just not been up to the task of keeping them safe,” Gerstein wrote. “That’s a belief that appears to be shared by at least some of the justices themselves.”
While a Supreme Court spokesperson declined to respond to Gerstein’s request for comment, an “in-depth review” of budget documents and interviews with “court insiders” revealed that the Supreme Court Police Department, which for years had less than 200 officers, may soon double its ranks amid the court’s plummeting favorability among Americans.
“It’s often said that the Supreme Court has no army,” Gerstein wrote. “Yet, with little fanfare, the size of the Supreme Court’s police force has begun mushrooming.”
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The growing taxpayer expense from the Supreme Court’s ballooning security budget has even roiled some lawmakers, including Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT), the leading Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee.
“We provide money for the Supreme Court,” DeLauro said back in April. “I’ve been here a long time – they’ve never come up and tell us what they’re doing with the money that we appropriate. I want to give them all the security they need, but the court has to come up here [and] tell us what [they’re] doing.”
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