In year-end report, chief justice defends judiciary’s independence

At the end of an eventful year at the Supreme Court that included a ruling giving former President Donald Trump broad immunity from criminal prosecution for his conduct while in office, reporting that controversial flags had flown at the homes of Justice Samuel Alito, and an ethics inquiry from Senate Democrats that found more gift trips that Justice Clarence Thomas had failed to disclose, Chief Justice John Roberts’ annual report, released on Tuesday evening, focused on what he sees as the threats to judicial independence.

One of those threats, Roberts wrote, is disinformation from abroad fomented by foreign countries. Although Roberts did not mention any of the “hostile foreign state actors” responsible for such disinformation by name, the justices will hear oral arguments next week in a challenge to a federal law that would require social media giant TikTok to shut down in the United States unless its parent company can sell it off by Jan. 19. A federal appeals court upheld the law earlier this month, calling it part of “a broader effort to counter a well-substantiated national security threat posed by the People’s Republic of China.” Roberts’ discussion of disinformation in his report seemed to suggest that he may be sympathetic to the TikTok ban.