On Wednesday, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) stood before reporters at the Capitol and announced a plan aimed squarely at a scheme the left has been openly plotting for years: packing the Supreme Court. According to Johnson, Republicans are introducing a constitutional amendment that would set the U.S. Supreme Court at nine justices, closing off any future attempt by Democrats to pack our nation’s highest court. "We are going to bring a constitutional amendment," Johnson said. "It is a bill to amend the U.S. Constitution to ensure that the U.S. Supreme Court remains composed of only nine justices. We will keep the nine."
Johnson didn't stop at the mechanics. He accused the "communist socialists in the Democrat Party who are taking the party over" of pushing a platform built for chaos. "They want to abolish the border," Johnson said. "They want to abolish prisons, defund police. One of their objectives, among all the crazy things, is they want to pack the U.S. Supreme Court."
🚨 WOW! Speaker Johnson just emerged and announced a Constitutional amendment to BAN Democrats from packing the Supreme Court
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) September 1, 2026
"We're putting the bill on the floor TOMORROW!"
"We WILL have them put their money where their mouth is!"
"We are going to bring a constitutional… pic.twitter.com/UYoyaqCSWB
This plan is, of course, easier said than done.
Amending the Constitution requires, just to start, a two-thirds vote in both chambers, so Johnson said the bill would hit the floor Wednesday under a suspension vote, usually reserved for noncontroversial bills. He framed it as a direct test for Democrats who claim distance from the far left. "There's a couple of Democrats here in the House who have suggested that they're not on board with the Democrat Socialists of America, just a few," Johnson said. "They're going to get a chance to show us tomorrow. We're going to see."
The threat of Democrats packing the court is very real.
Joe Biden assembled a commission to give himself political cover to expand the bench. However, the joke was on him because the commission came back and rejected the idea outright, and for good reason. The commission argued that expansion for partisan purposes could set off a cycle with no natural stopping point.
"There are other reasons to believe expansion efforts might have negative effects on the Supreme Court's long-term legitimacy or undermine its role in our legal system. Court expansion today could lead to a continuous cycle of future expansions," the report warned. "According to one purportedly modest estimate of the consequences of expansion as parties gain Senate majorities and add Justices, the Supreme Court could expand to twenty-three or twenty-nine Justices in the next fifty years, and thirty-nine or possibly sixty-three Justices over the next century. But just as important as the raw numbers, if the country and the political system were to be embroiled in repeated fights over Court expansion, that alone could harm the Supreme Court's public reputation."
ICYMI: This Is the Reason Leftists Are Screaming Right Now
The reality is that Democrats have stopped pretending to care about what people think of court packing. They are openly campaigning on it now, which is why this plan faces long odds. If they are not worried about appearances, they will never support locking the court at nine justices. Instead, they will keep framing expansion as a way to fix a court they insist is illegitimate because it doesn’t rule the way they want to.
That said, I think the effort would have more impact if Republicans also introduced a bill to expand the Supreme Court to 13 justices. Remember, Kamala Harris said on the record that 13 is the right number, and Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.) said he agrees with her. If Democrats believe that, they can prove it by voting for it now, with Trump filling the new seats, or join Republicans in taking court packing off the table for good.
