Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government (Murkowski): Hearings to examine proposed budget estimates and justification for fiscal year 2027 for the Supreme Court of the United States.

Before we begin, I'd like to just take a moment to remember our colleague Lindsey Graham. He was a statesman and a friend to everybody here. He had just a unique ability to bring levity to a situation, no matter how serious it was. Justice Kagan and I recall his engagement with you when you were coming through your confirmation hearing that we're still laughing about today, and I think it allowed you to show a very human side of yourself. But Lindsey had that ability to do just that, uh, and, and I think at, at very appropriate times.

And we're gonna miss him very dearly. And I just want everybody to know that, that he, his family, and our staff are in our prayers. To turn to the matter at hand, this is the third and final hearing of fiscal year 2027 cycle for the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee. First, I'd like to welcome our distinguished witnesses, Justice Kagan and Justice Barrett of the United States Supreme Court. It's been a number of years since Supreme Court justices testified before the Senate, so I want to thank you both for being here today.

The work of the Supreme Court is of paramount importance, and I look forward to hearing from you about the resources that the court needs to do that work. Before I turn to the Supreme Court's budget request, I want to direct a few words to my colleagues and to those of you that are here in attendance today about the actual purpose of this hearing. Unlike federal departments, the Supreme Court is not a creature of Congress.— but it's a creature of the Constitution itself. It's equal in dignity to the Congress and to the president. And unlike the legislative and executive powers, the founders crafted the judicial power to be independent from the political branches.

That independent judicial authority, characterized in Alexander Hamilton's words by neither force nor will, but merely judgment, is the best expedient to secure a steady upright, and an impartial administration of the laws. It's crucial that we respect that independence, which is embedded in the separation of powers that forms the backbone of American government.

The judicial branch is not wholly insulated from Congress, however. Congress's power of the purse imparts not only the authority but the responsibility to fund every part of the government, including the Supreme Court. It's therefore important for our branches to work together to ensure that the court has the resources necessary to perform its constitutional duties. With these facts in mind, I want to be clear that this hearing is about the Supreme Court's physical, operational, and security needs and will be conducted in light of the court's unique relationship to Congress. This hearing is not a forum for discussion about the merits of specific cases, past, present, or future.

It's not about when the justices should recuse themselves from cases or anything along those lines. I encourage my colleagues to focus their questions accordingly. And as a reminder, each senator will have one round of 8 minutes to ask their questions. I also expect that our guests today will maintain order in the hearing room so that we conclude our business with efficiency and civility. We'll have no tolerance for interruptions today.

And any demonstration or disorderly conduct will result in prompt removal.

The Supreme Court's budget request for fiscal year 2027 seeks $2,007 million in discretionary funding. This amount is $13.9 million, or 7.2%, increase over the total amount of discretionary funding provided for the Supreme Court for fiscal year 2026. The requested increase is driven by an increasingly dangerous threat environment and the recognition that more resources are needed to counteract this concerning reality. There's no denying that we're experiencing a disturbing level of violence against those who serve in the highest levels of government. President Trump has now survived 3 assassination attempts in the past 2 years.

Yesterday was the second anniversary of the attempted assassination in Butler, Pennsylvania, where the assassin's bullet actually drew blood. But for a millimeter, President Trump would have been killed. Tragically, one American was killed and two more were critically injured. That's hardly the only instance. Our colleague Rand Paul suffered felonious assault.

Some— someone firebombed Governor Josh Shapiro's home. House Majority Leader Steve Scalise narrowly survived an assassination attempt as more congressmen stood in the line of fire. Of course, political violence is not solely directed to elected officials.— as we at least recently saw this with the tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk. And particularly relevant for today's hearing, the Supreme Court has not escaped this dark trend of politically motivated violence. Following the 2022 leak of the Dobbs draft opinion, a man who was intent, I presume, on preserving the Roe decision tried to kill Justice Kavanaugh at his home, bringing with him a gun, a knife, pepper spray, zip ties, lockpicking equipment.— and duct tape.

Separately, Justice Alito's staff opened an envelope to find a white powdery substance inside. Ultimately, the substance was harmless, but it was intended to terrorize the court and intimidate and obstruct operations. We also observed hundreds of demonstrators gathering outside the justices' homes, attempting to intimidate and influence them, an apparent violation of 18 U.S.C. 1507. —Yet without a single arrest by the Department of Justice.

Justice Barrett was the target of a swatting attack intended to create an environment that could have created potential injury for her or her family. These disturbing instances force us to be—force us to confront the reality that the physical security of each member of the Supreme Court is a matter of constitutional consequence. Though maintaining operational security might require obscuring some details, I'm hopeful that the justices today will be able to testify in a manner that helps us understand these threats. Accompanying the rise in physical threats is also a rise in cyber threats. In January, a man pleaded guilty to hacking the Supreme Court's electronic filing system at least 25 times.

We've observed a surge in cyber threats directed toward the lower courts. It's not hyperbole to say that the attacks of this nature can be a matter of life and death. Sealed court documents can include information about confidential informants and classified national security information, not to mention Social Security numbers, sensitive medical records, and trade secrets that would be essential to our economic dominance. The risk of insecure and unreliable electronic court records is not a risk that we can accept. To defend against these threats and avoid the proliferation of attacks currently facing the lower courts, the Supreme Court's budget seeks a modest program increase to enhance its cybersecurity personnel.

Thank you for appearing before the subcommittee today, Justices Kagan and Barrett. I'm pleased to have you before us today, and I look forward to our testimony. But before you begin, I now want to turn to my colleague, the ranking member of the subcommittee, Senator Jack Reed, for his opening statement. Well, thank you very much, Chairman Hagerty, and for convening this very important hearing. And I want to thank Justice Kagan and Justice Barrett for appearing before us.

I also want to Again, note the passing of a dear colleague, Senator Lindsey Graham. I served in the House and the Senate with Lindsey, and I will describe him briefly as a passionate patriot. Indeed, he was that.

Madam Justice, Madam Justice, this is a long overdue opportunity for us to question the members of the court about its budget and operations. And I'll stress budget and operations. This is, I believe, the first time time since 2011 that a justice has testified before the Senate, and I would hope this would be an annual occurrence, not a decade-by-decade occurrence. Uh, the Supreme Court is, under our Constitution, the final arbitrator of the law of the land, but it is still accountable to Congress for taxpayers' funds which you use to operate. And today's hearing is about your fiscal FY 2027 budget request, a budget that's grown significantly in the last few years.

We know, as the chairman has pointed out, that you have faced a series of threatening attempts, you and your colleagues— assassination attempts to online cybersecurity threats. And we know that the number of threats are increasing each year. And it is a substantial justification for budget increases to protect the court and protect the Constitution. So I look forward from hearing from both of you about the— these issues and the needs that you have to protect yourself and your colleagues. Uh, in regard to these threats, the court created its own residential security operation, and Congress responded to the request with a $28 million appropriation, but weeks after that CR was signed, the court began privately lobbying for another $30 million.

And we understand security is important, but we also understand that this should be an open process and that your request should come to us and the committee to dispose— be disposed of as we typically do with all appropriations. And I would— I urge you to adopt that practice.

This committee has responded to the court's request, as I said, for more money, and we hope to do it again. But I must point out that unless we have a top-line budget, both domestic and defense, it's going to be difficult to fund domestic— particularly domestic agencies like the court. And I hope that Chair Collins and Vice Chair Murray will reach that point very soon. The other thing I would just point out is that— and I know this came up this morning— is that you have adopted a code of ethics, but a code of ethics without effective enforcement is more aspirational than practical. And I would hope that this year in your budget request you would include funds for enforcement structure as well as simply the code existing.

I'm very honored— we all are— by your presence today, and I indeed look forward to listening to your responses and to cooperating with you so that we can strengthen the court and provide the support you need to carry out one of the most principal duties in America, which is making sure the Constitution is alive and well throughout the nation. Thank you very much. Thank you, Senator Reid. And now I'd like to recognize Justice Kagan. Justice Kagan, I look forward to your opening remarks, and I'll remind you that your full statement will be at—.

Thank you, Chairman Hagerty, and thank you, Ranking Member Reid, for giving Justice Barrett and me the opportunity to appear here before you today. I hope we can do it more than once every 3 decades. That doesn't I don't see him too much to ask for, um, uh, to present the Supreme Court's fiscal year 2027 budget request. I'd like to start, Senator Hagerty, if I, if I might, the same way you did, by, uh, speaking a bit about Senator Graham. Um, and I did this, uh, this morning as well, but you've provided me with a— I, I talked this morning about exactly what you talked about.

First, I want to say that, uh, the entire court wants to send its condolences to Senator Graham's family and all his colleagues and friends in the Senate and elsewhere. All of us have been through the Judiciary Committee, and most of us through the Judiciary Committee while Senator Graham sat on it, and there is a great deal of affection throughout the entire court for Senator Graham, a great deal of affection and respect. I want to add, though, my personal note here. Um, uh, I was nominated to the court by a Democratic president. It is not very often that a Republican votes for a nominee from a Democratic president.

And similarly, it's not very often that a Democratic senator votes for a nominee of a Republican president. Those are the times we live in. And it's especially uncommon when such, uh, cross-party, if you will, votes come from somebody in a deep red or deep blue state. And notwithstanding that, Senator Graham voted for my confirmation to be a Supreme Court Justice, and I was very grateful for that, and I was enormously impressed by the respect with which Senator Graham treated me throughout the process, the seriousness with which he took the process, and as I say, grateful for his vote at the end of the process. But Senator Hagerty, you referenced something, you know, in this last day or so, everybody has been talking about how funny Senator Graham was.

But it's harder to make somebody else look funny than to be funny yourself. And I have to say, that day Senator Graham made me look funny. And that conversation that we had about what I was doing on Christmas one year, is the conversation that I was told by many people afterwards sealed the deal on my confirmation. So I was, I was very thankful to Senator Graham for that and for all his kindnesses through that process. And again, just want to repeat my and, and the broader court's deepest condolences to his sister, to all his friends and family on his untimely passing.

Thank you very much for that, Justice. Gagan, I appreciate that. In fact, his sister is going to be sworn in during the course of this, so you may see some of us moving in and out to address that. Thank you.

I would like to note at the outset how appreciative we are of the subcommittee's constructive engagement and support. You and your staff have been with us each step of the way as we've added security funding to meet the challenges of these times. I personally have enjoyed meeting with a couple of you, um, about these matters, and our respective staffs also speak and share information regularly. I look forward to our future work. The Supreme Court's funding is provided separately from the lower federal courts and split between two appropriations: one for salaries and expenses related to the daily operations of the court, and another for care of the buildings and grounds.

We will address the operating budget today. The Architect of the Capitol will submit a separate statement concerning our buildings and grounds. The Court's operating budget funds the daily activities you'd expect in any federal courthouse, such as library and research services, case management, visitor services, IT, facility management, and security. We carry out our work with relatively modest funding. Our budget represents just 2% of the Judiciary Branch's total funding, which in turn represents 1/10 of 1% of the federal budget.

Nonetheless, we take our responsibility as fiscal stewards very seriously. In fiscal year 2027, the Court is requesting an additional $14 million a 7% increase for salaries and expenses. Over the last 5 fiscal years, the Supreme Court's funding needs have grown on average 15% per year. Aside from annual inflationary increases, recent growth in the Court's budget has been almost entirely for security expenses. The majority of last year's funding increase went to shifting the responsibility for residential security from the Marshal Service to the Supreme Court Police.

And Ranking Member Reid, um, I'd be delighted to speak at some, uh, greater length about what you talked about, about our receiving one appropriation and then another specifically for this purpose, for enhancing residential security. I first joined the court in 2010. Our security was very different at that time. The Supreme Court Police focused almost exclusively on protecting the building. And as for cybersecurity, well, our IT department focused on supporting the latest BlackBerry devices.

I didn't have a security team of my own and was accompanied by security personnel only when I participated in work-related public events. We began expanding our security program in earnest in 2017, initially at the behest of members of Congress. We engaged government and private industry experts to evaluate our needs, We started by expanding personal security beyond the Chief Justice so that associate justices also received small security details—much too small, as it later turned out. As threat assessments called for larger details, and as overtime costs correspondingly rose, we requested funding for more officers, vehicles, and support staff. As events at the Capitol and other federal courthouses revealed our buildings' vulnerabilities, we also added new physical security systems.

When personal threats increased following the leak of the court's Dobbs opinion, we expanded our residential security and threat assessment activities still further. Similarly, as online attacks grew in number and sophistication, we requested additional cybersecurity resources. Our strategy has been consistent: expand incrementally, but effectively to meet evolving security challenges. We aren't alone in this. Although orders of magnitude smaller, the Supreme Court's Police Department is modeled after your own Capitol Police Department.

The two departments have matching pay tables and similar organizational charts. They work closely together on threats pertaining to the Capitol campus and beyond. They also face many of the same challenges, especially officer recruitment and retention, and they have implemented many of the same solutions to address those challenges. Over the last 5 years, the Capitol Police Department's annual operating needs have increased 70%, a figure similar to the court's. For fiscal year 2027, Capitol Police requested a 16% increase.

As neighbors, our two police departments will continue to work cooperatively together. Our respective police departments' growing needs are obvious given current conditions. The Capitol Police Chief recently testified that threats against Congress are up 50% this year. The Supreme Court Police expect a smaller but still substantial 38% annual increase in threats this year, which follows a 25% increase last year. For some of those For some of us, those threats have come very close indeed, as the Chairman indicated, and all of us live with the knowledge that they may again materialize.

But as the Chief Justice has said most recently in his annual statement, all members of the Court continue to do their jobs as they believe legally right, adjudicating cases without fear or favor. We are grateful to the Supreme Court Police for all they do to support our ability to do so, and grateful to our appropriators in the Senate and the House for the resources that are necessary to achieve that goal. While we cannot comment on decisions or pending cases, Justice Barrett and I are happy to answer any budget-related questions you may have. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

And I'm going to, uh, now turn it to the committee chair, Senator Collins. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. First of all, let me welcome our distinguished witnesses today. It's a great honor to have you here, uh, to respond to our questions. I could not help but think as I heard Justice Kagan's comments about the 38% increase in the number of threats, that it is increasingly dangerous to be a Supreme Court justice these days.

And it's appalling to me that some of the rhetoric is coming from public officials on both sides of the aisle. Who should know better than to levy personal and political attacks against the judiciary and the court specifically. For example, a senator stood in front of the Supreme Court building and called out two members by name, saying that they had released the whirlwind and that they will pay the the price. Other public officials have called the court corrupt, out of control, and serving an extremist agenda. This overheated language, this completely inappropriate rhetoric against the Supreme Court, endangers the lives of the justices and erodes public trust in our system of government.

I believe that all of us must avoid that kind of dangerous and disturbing rhetoric because it could in fact trigger violence. So with that as an introduction, Let me turn to some specific questions for you. Justice Barrett, the Supreme Court is taking over residential security for the justices from the U.S. Marshals Service. What was the rationale for that change?

Thank you, Chair Collins. The marshals was always designed to be temporary. They couldn't continue to staff us. In fact, one reason for our supplemental request that was somewhat unexpected is that the marshals unexpectedly told us that they would not be able to provide— continue providing the residential protection, and that they were going to end it quicker than we had anticipated. They themselves were just stretched thin.

So we had always wanted to take it over ourselves. Um, but we were forced to do that on a quicker timeline, and we are now fully doing it within the Supreme Court Police through a combination of our full-time officers and contractors. Thank you. Justice Kagan, in the Supreme Court's building and grounds account, there is a request for $6.5 million to begin the process for an exterior screening facility for visitors to the court. Could you explain why the court needs that separate facility?

Yes, uh, right now visitors walk into the court and that's where they're checked. That's where they are sent through a magnum— magnometer and, you know, checked for weapons and so forth. And just as the Capitol decided that for security reasons it wished to create a visitor center that was off the main premises so all the appropriate security could be— checks could be done off premises, that's what we're looking into as well. Thank you. Justice Kagan, as you know, the Federal Judicial Center publishes a ref— reference manual for federal judges to use when handling cases that involve scientific evidence.

The Center, whose board is chaired by the Chief Justice, published its latest version of the manual on December 31st of last year. I understand that you wrote the foreword to this edition. I— I am aware of concerns that this version included a chapter that, in the judgment of some people, disfavored a particular class of litigants by suggesting that contested issues were not, in fact, contested. Are you aware of this controversy? I have become aware of it.

As you say, I wrote the foreword. The foreword is just a— a page-long thing that the Federal Judicial Center asked me to provide, as other justices have provided for other editions of the book. So I hadn't read the chapter in question prior to that time. Actually, I still haven't read it, but I know that the controversy that you're referring to, which is about the climate science chapter and whether there were statements made within that chapter treating as treating as uncontested things that many people continue to contest. And the head of the Federal Judicial Center, Judge Rosenberg, has engaged with the people who have made those criticisms and those objections.

In the end, the Federal Judicial Center has withdrawn that chapter from the book on the view that anything that gets so many people riled up and anything that so many people think, wow, that was way too hasty, there's still lots of disagreement about things that you presented as entirely agreed upon, should not be in a book of this kind. The entire purpose of this book really is not to take positions on contested and contestable matters. It's to help judges, assist judges with respect to scientific issues, but not on a, you know, not with any kind of slant either way. And because so many people did think that that chapter was slanted in a particular direction, Judge Rosenberg decided to take it out of the book. I know that she is engaged with members of Congress.

About her decision about where to, you know, what to do next, about how to make sure that the processes that the Federal Judicial Center uses are good ones and that a situation like this does not come up again. The Federal Judicial Center is a generally terrific organization, and that's why, you know, I was glad when they asked me, like, write a few paragraphs introducing the book. This is a book that's existed for 30 years and has, in different editions, and has assisted countless numbers of judges during that time. So I was glad to do that, and I think that Judge Rosenberg's hope is that things will be learned from this experience and that we won't, that the Federal Judicial Center won't ever find itself in this position again. My thanks to you both for your service.

Thank you, Senator Collins. Um, and I want to thank both of you for appearing today. Again, Senator Collins alluded to the fact that it's becoming increasingly dangerous to serve as a Supreme Court justice. The statistics underscore that. But beyond the statistics, there's a human aspect to all of this as well.

Uh, that's the fact that you and your families have to live in an escalated threat environment. And so I'd like to start with you, Justice Kagan. You've been on the bench for 16 years at the Supreme Court. You've seen the environment change, and if you could just elaborate on how it's changed and how it's affected you and your family. Yeah, I joined the court in 2010, and it was an entirely different world then.

We did everything— you know, I just walked out on the street. I had no security with me at any time. I drove back and forth to work by myself. You know, every so often when I went out to do a major speech, security personnel would accompany me there. But honestly, none of us particularly thought about it at that time.

We started thinking about it in 2016. And the occasion of that was Justice Scalia's passing. Justice Scalia went down to Texas for a trip and and when he died, there were no security personnel in the immediate environment. The closest marshals were some 2 hours away. And that made people a little bit sit up and take notice.

And right after that, 2 members of the House, Congressman Issa and Congressman Cummings, they were in the midst of an exploration of the various security services provided to people in government, and particularly with respect to the Secret Service. And the way the Chief Justice described the conversation that they had with him to us was this: that Congressman Issa and Cummings came into the Chief Justice's office and said, "You know, we've been taking a long hard look at security in different parts of the government, and we think you're out of your mind." that they said, you know, the office of— the director of the Office of Personnel Management has more security than the Supreme Court justices do. And surely, the Supreme Court justices are doing more things that are more controversial on a more continuing basis than the director of the Office of Personnel Management. So, the Chief Justice came into our conference one day and sort of told us about this conversation and said, you know, things have got to change., and we started to change them. I mean, there was a little bit of like, "Oh, do we really need this?" Because, you know, it's more pleasant to live without security than it is to live with security.

So there was a little bit of resistance, but I think people recognized the wisdom of what the Congressman had told us. And so we started incrementally, and, you know, to increase security presence, we started to think about each individual justice having a separate detail. That knew their, their practices, that knew the way they lived, that knew the kinds of security needs that they had. And then the, the big ramp-up after that— there was, you know, sort of an incremental ramp-up, and the big ramp-up came with the leak of the Dobbs opinion, when the— when the threats— the threat level really dramatically increased for some of my colleagues. And And that's when there was, you know, what had been going on acquired even more urgency.

So I think that that's the history of the thing. Right now, each of us has a detail of between 4 and 8 security people. They accompany us pretty much everywhere. So life has changed a great deal for all of us. It certainly has since 2010, even yesterday here at the Capitol.

There was a man apprehended and arrested pulling up to one of the barricades here at the Capitol asking for directions to the Supreme Court, and he had a gun in his lap. So it's striking, and I'm glad we're focusing on this now. Justice Barrett, you've obviously served a shorter period of time than Justice Kagan, but I'd like to know your perspective as well and how it's affecting you, your family, and what you've perceived as the threat. Thank you, Chairman Hagerty. Yeah, I've experienced it in a very personal way, and I can share just a few of my own experiences.

There was a time, and it was shortly after the Dobbs leak, when the threats to my life were particularly intense, and my security detail thought it was a good idea for me to have a bulletproof vest. So I took it home from the House, went into my bedroom, threw it down, and turned around, and my 12-year-old son was in the doorway, and he said, "What's that?" And when I took this job, I didn't really anticipate being in the position of having to explain to one of my children what a bulletproof vest is. What the vest was and why his mom had it. So that was, that was one issue. It was reported in the news that about 6 weeks ago I was the victim of a swatting incident at my house.

One of our teenage sons walked out the front door getting ready to head out with friends, and the street was full of county policemen. And then I also had my residential security presence there. They had responded to a false alarm saying that there was a gun— gunshots being fired inside my home. And I was very grateful for the residential security because they were able to coordinate with the county police before the county police entered my home. And the other thing I'll say, and this is not unique to me and my colleagues, but this is experienced by people throughout the federal judiciary, are anonymized deliveries.

And they often come in the name of the murdered son of one of our district judges. The message that these, you know, pizzas and other things that are sent to us, you know, is fairly clear. They're often sent to members of our immediate and extended families as well. They're meant to intimidate and they're meant to harass. And as the Chief Justice said in his year-end report, justices and judges throughout the country continue to do their jobs without fear or favor.

But it is a very threatening environment. And if I might add just a teeny bit, this is a problem that not only Supreme Court justices face, but judges all across the United States, federal judges and state judges as well. And most of them have considerably less in the way of security resources than we do. So it's, um, uh, an especial issue to try to figure out how to get better security for judges all over the United States, even as we focus today on the Supreme Court's security needs. I, I'll come to another point that I think concerns all of us, and it has an impact on your security as well, and that's the leaking of information, uh, coming from the Supreme Court.

Um, if you think about the leaks of confidential Supreme Court communications, the impact of that, you've— as you've both described, the Dobbs case is obviously the most famous one, and that precipitated, you know, untold intimidation, threats, an attempt to murder one of the justices. Uh, incredibly sad. But there have been others. In 2024, there was a leak about court deliberations over cases that involve presidential immunity. Um, just in April this year, there was a leak of internal memoranda discussing, discussing requests to stay President Obama's Clean Power Plan.

Um, and if you think about it, the Dobbs decision, I think, underscores this, that leaking of this information dramatically increases the security risk on, on justices. Um, and Justice Kagan, I'll start with you. Are these sorts of leaks from the Supreme Court acceptable? Other not. It dramatically increases security risks.

It also dramatically changes the way we do our business internally, or at least has the potential to do so. I mean, the way we relate to each other depends so much on honest communication among the 9 of us. And if the 9 of us don't have trust in one another and don't have trust in one another and all the people who work for us, then those kinds of honest conversations that we need to do our business are not going to take place, or they're at least going to be frustrated. So, it's a— I think it is a problem that has frustrated every single one of the justices because of the security issues, but because it, you know, it's just not the way a court should operate and not the way a court can operate. If it wants to have the kind of deliberations that are the backbone of what we do.

I appreciate that, and I really appreciate you making this statement publicly and on the record, because I think it's critically important that a leader like yourself make this clear to everybody. Uh, Justice Barrett, I'll just close with you. Are, are there any actions undertaken, any changes in procedures that will prevent leaks like this from occurring? We're doing our best. We have instituted protocols to try to keep better track of who has access to documents, who's touched documents, where they've been printed.

We have always required employees to sign a confidentiality agreement, but recently we required employees— began requiring employees to sign a nondisclosure agreement, which we do have carve-outs for whistleblowers and that sort of thing, and those carve-outs go beyond what federal statutes require, but we're hoping that driving the need for confidentiality home with these NDAs will just be an additional check on employees who are sharing information inappropriately and often illegally. For all the reasons Justice Kagan mentioned, I can't say— I can't support it any more than I do. I appreciate the effort, and thank you. I'll turn it now to Ranking Member Reid. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Again, Justices, thank you for your presence and your testimony. I just want to pick up on a point that Senator Collins made about some outrageous statements that are being made by public figures, and I can't think of a more prominent one than the President of the United States. So on February 20th, following your decision on tariffs, he said, "Disgrace to our nation, fools, lapdogs for the RINOs and radical left Democrats, and very unpatriotic and disloyal to the Constitution." And he was describing the Supreme Court. On March 15th, he posted, "Our country was unnecessarily ransacked by the United States Supreme Court." which has become little more than a weaponized and unjust political organization. Now, I don't agree with anything he said, but if there's anyone in the country that commands more attention, it's the president.

And I think that behavior is very dangerous to the court and to our whole system. And I just want that to be part of the record. Now, Justice Kagan, you asked—. If I could, Senator, please, wherever these come from, And, you know, whatever political figure says them, whatever party that political figure is a member of, it— these statements are really unhelpful. They're dangerous in terms of individual justices' security, and they're not appropriate in the way to treat a coordinated branch of government.

I think the Chief Justice had a year-end statement last year where he talked about this issue, and he talked about, like, criticism is fair game. I mean, go for it. You know, it's life in the big city is that you're subject to all kinds of criticism. But intimidation is a different thing entirely. And when political figures of any stripe are trying to intimidate judges and justices to do things that they like rather than the things that they don't, that, that's where we really have crossed a line.

I think you're exactly right, Your Honor, and you said it well. You wanted a moment to talk about the process where the $28 million request was made through appropriations channels and then $30 million appeared suddenly through private channels. Please. Yeah, I think Justice Barrett referenced this a bit. And, and first off, we apologize if we did anything so procedurally improper.

But the reason for the additional ask, if you will, was that— is that we were suddenly confronted with the loss of U.S. Marshal protection. And we, we thought that we were going to have U.S. Marshal protection. At our residences for another 6 months, and all of a sudden learned from the Justice Department that that was going to be impossible.

And so we had to do some sort of quick footwork to try to get additional monies in order to cover that 6-month gap. And as I say, if we, um, did that in a way that was procedurally less than optimal, um, my apologies. Well, uh, your security is more important than procedural niceties, so there's no issue here.

I mentioned in my statement that the court has adopted a code of conduct, but without an enforcement mechanism, it's more aspirational than real. Is there any— and both you and Justice Comey— is there any attempts now to create a very effective enforcement system? You want to start? I guess I would start by saying I regard the code of ethics as more than aspirational. We've all 9 made a commitment to follow it, so I consider it binding on me.

I would also say that we all draw on resources within the court to make sure, you know, to help us to the end of discharging our ethical responsibilities. Whenever I have a question, I consult our legal counsel inside the court. On the question of enforceability, I mean, I think you've put your finger on what is a very difficult question. It's a complex question. It's one that we've talked about a lot as a conference, and I don't think it's one that we're entirely at rest on yet.

If I could just say a few words about some of the complexities, I mean, one is it's just tricky to figure out who would be the entity to enforce such a code. You know, sometimes people have floated the idea of an inspector general. Well, if that comes from the executive branch, to have someone from the executive branch inside the court supervising the court's work. Well, that's, that's a problem that needs to come from within the judiciary. And then you have the awkwardness of, well, we review the work of other judges within the system, but then they would be sitting on the committee to review ethical complaints, and that creates its own awkwardnesses.

So we've talked about the possibility of senior judges or retired judges, but then there's still a structural problem because then you need to have an appeal process. The way, the way the lower courts work is they judge these things at the circuit court level, but then you can appeal it up to the judicial, to the Judicial Conference's Committee on Judicial Conduct, and then up to the full Judicial Conference itself. So that mechanism would put, again, judges from lower courts reviewing our code. So I'm not saying that it would be impossible, you know, to have an enforcement mechanism, but I think it's been complicated to figure out exactly what that would be. Given the position of the Supreme Court within our constitutional structure and within the judicial branch of government.

But I do want to stress, Ranking Member Reed, that none of my colleagues, and certainly not I, think ourselves above the law or above ethics in any way. And I wouldn't say I agree with that. I come out in a somewhat— you know, I think for me, I have— I'm not so much influx on this issue. I have come to rest on the need for an enforcement mechanism if the enforcement mechanism is of the right kind. It's not because I think that we're ignoring the Code of Conduct.

I do not think that at all, um, um, but it's important, I think, for public perception of the court. I think it's also important to, um, to, to, to, to give the justices a way to show that some of the charges against them are you know, so much poppycock.

And I completely agree with Justice Barrett that this cannot be something where the executive appoints somebody or Congress appoints somebody or has a particular role in the process. It has to come from within the judicial branch itself if the Supreme Court is to remain independent. And it's incredibly important that it remain independent.

You know, I think that we can figure out a way around some of the complexities that Justice Barrett talked about, about using senior judges or retired judges to be our policemen, if you will, even though I agree it's a little bit of an awkward structure to have policemen for the judges who are at the apex of the branch. Um, uh, agree with everything Justice Barrett said about the need to do this within, uh, the judiciary, um, and the complexities of that. Um, I, I would say we should, uh, find an enforcement mechanism. Thank you. Uh, just a final point, which is I think the court has not escaped, uh, the, the, uh, situation of every other branch of government.

Which is according to polling from Pew, 48% of Americans have a favorable opinion of the Supreme Court. That's down from 70% 5 years ago. And I think putting in these types of institutional checks might give more confidence to the people that, you know, there's nothing wrong at the court. The other thing, though, it goes back to the initial points of these inflammatory statements made by public figures, politicians, etc., are not helpful to the court's prestige. I think we should recognize the court plays a unique and fundamental role, and we should respect that role.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Senator Durbin. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for being here. I want to follow up.

Senator Reid has touched two areas that I wanted to address. And one is the statements made by elected officials and others derogatory of judges, justices, and the court. Tomorrow we're considering Attorney General— Acting Attorney General Todd Blanchard's nomination, who has said of the court that they are rogue activist judges and repeatedly claim the administration is, quote, at war with the federal judiciary. That kind of rhetoric, I think, is unacceptable on either side of the table, Democrat or Republican, liberal, conservative. It just inflames people and has them thinking in terms of violence that may reach physical violence if we're not careful.

So I want to just add the chorus that violence is unacceptable at any stage of the spectrum. Secondly, we had some terrible incidents in the Northern District of Illinois not that long ago, where one of the federal district court judges had a disgruntled person who appeared in that court, then went to her home and took the life of her mother and husband. Uh, it was a horrible incident that occurred. Since then, I've done my best to try to provide the resources, not just for that court, but for the courts across the country. And what I— can eliciting your response, I think your position on Capitol Hill makes you a little different than most.

But is it your impression— it is mine— that in speaking to district court judges, they often lament the fact that they're waiting for the GSA to respond to security measures in their courts and their court buildings? We have a proposal that I'm working on which would allow the courts themselves to administer and work— monitor these funds to see if they can do it more quickly and professionally and thoroughly. Have you heard responses from other courtrooms around the country of security concerns that are going unmet? Yes, and I think that's part of their budget request. Judge Lefkoe is the judge I think you were talking about, and I served with her when I was on the Seventh Circuit.

Um, and I think precisely because of those sorts of things, yes, it is my understanding that the lower federal courts are also in great need of security funding and have been pushing for that in their courthouses and through GSA as well. And we're in a bit of a different position because we don't use GSA. We're under the Capitol Architect and have done very well with the Architect of the Capitol, which that office has always, you know, been very attentive to our needs. But the lower federal courts are reliant on GSA, and I know have some significant concerns. Yes, very much so.

And it's interesting, a few of the judges came to Capitol Hill to speak to members, and each time they would speak to one of the senators about the situation in their courthouses, they got the same response: where do we sign up for going some different route, more efficient route, a quicker response when it comes to security? And I would just say, Mr. Chairman, that I think is going to fall in our jurisdiction here in the future, and I hope We take it seriously. I thank you both for being here today. Thank you, Senator. Thank you, Senator.

Senator Boozman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you all for being here. We appreciate your service and sacrifice, not only you but your families. These are certainly family endeavors. And again, we really do appreciate that.

I had the opportunity to chair this committee several years ago, and during that time it was well known that you all were perhaps the most efficient entity in government as far as taking care of your finances. I think we actually had you all send back some money on occasion, which is totally unheard of here. So we appreciate the fact that you do do a good job in that regard regarding fiscal—. We probably took pride in that, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, it's Again, it's an unusual thing that happens. So we do appreciate the fact that you're serving and the risks that you're taking. Let me ask you something that we haven't, I don't think, really gotten into, but right now, can you tell us if there are any barriers currently hindering the sharing of threat assessment and risk mitigation between the court police and outside agencies such as the Marshals, Capitol Police, local police departments. Is all that working well? I'm actually not certain about that, Senator Bozeman.

We can have our staff get back to you with statistics about that. I don't know, do you have more knowledge? I was just going to say that I think at least the relationship between the Supreme Court Police and the Capitol Police is excellent. Yes. And that they talk to each other all the time and they exchange exchange information with each other, and I think increase the— that increases the effectiveness of both.

So I think that that's a relationship that's on an extreme— at an extremely good place. Good. Very good. The other ones, we're not sure. Yeah.

Um, no, and I was curious if they were doing, you know, tactical training together or whatever, you know. So we can get you more information on that. Again, that's something we certainly would be willing to help you with if that's not the case. Tell us about staffing. So many of our entities, our police, various police departments throughout the country, you name it, and they're having trouble with staffing problems, attracting, you know, the quality people that we'd like.

Our law enforcement does a tremendous job, but that is an issue. Do you all see the same issue?

Environment in which to hire police officers. You know, there are fewer police officers than there is demand for police officers. And I know that the Capitol Police is experiencing that, and we're certainly experiencing that. So we're trying to ramp up, but in this, this environment where the supply is less than the demand, we've used various kinds of recruitment incentives. So we've tried to structure our pay in order to be— to really compete well for police officers, and we try to ensure that we're the best possible place to work.

But— and I think we're making great strides, so we really have increased our police force substantially, but we still have a ways to go to get it to where we want it to be. So it's still sort of foot on the gas, and And this is, this is not something that can be done overnight to get a quality police force. I think we're still looking for 100, 150 more officers, and that will take some time. Very good. So tell us again, you, you know, you have this fiscal year '27 request in, increased funding.

Um, tell us how that request will increase security and make the court and your lives safer? Sure, so I can take a crack at that. I mean, the, the items that we are hoping to fund through this 2027 fiscal year request are personnel is, is the biggest line item, and that would be for new officers in our Dignitary Protection Unit and building security officers. So that's the most pressing gap? That would be—.

That is what the bulk of the money is for. That's $14.6 $1.6 million. We would like another residential security office. We are running out of space inside the court building to house the new security officers that are staffing the residences. So that accounts for another $2 million.

I'm going to put my glasses on here. 12 New cybersecurity experts to deal with the increasing threats to our court systems, which Chairman Hagerty mentioned before. And then annual inflationary increases And, you know, that's about it. That gets us to about 14. Very good.

Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And again, we appreciate your service and sacrifice. And I think you make a very compelling case, a great argument. You know, you're in a different situation now. You're not hearing an argument.

You're actually giving an argument. And I think so far you're doing very well. Thank you, Senator Bozeman. It's easier to be up there, though, you know. I don't know about that, Justice.

Senator Coons. Thank you very much, Chairman Hagerty, and thank you, Justices, for being here. I served alongside Senator Bozeman on this exact subcommittee, and having previously served at the county level where security and protection for our courthouse was a part of my responsibilities. And having seen some really disturbing incidents at the state and local level and federally, I welcome this conversation. Senator Cornyn and I worked together to promptly introduce and get unanimously passed the Supreme Court Police Parity Act in 2022.

And I have a couple of bills I want to talk about, but let me pick up where Senator Durbin left off and reference back my time on FSGG. The Judicial Conference described the condition of the federal judiciary's facilities as having reached a crisis point. I'd say that's certainly true of the courthouse in Wilmington, Delaware, uh, and asked Congress to create a separate Judiciary Building Service that would transfer responsibility from the General Services Administration for the judiciary. I'm— I'd just be interested in what you think of this proposal and whether creating a new JBS, uh, would be preferable to reforming GSA, um, and whether assuming direct control over courthouse management might improve efficiency and reduce costs. Or might be a needless burden on the federal judiciary?

I think we probably don't know enough about the specifics of the bills to be able to comment on that. I think we have heard— we said before— frustration among federal judges, uh, about the current system. Exactly how it should be changed, I think, um, we're not prepared to say. We'd certainly welcome your input on it at some point because I clerked for Judge Roth in a courthouse that, when I have visited recently, is exactly the same. Yeah.

And with the same security challenges that it had 40 years ago. The primary role, Justice Barrett, of the Marshal Service is to protect the federal judiciary and the federal court system and to enforce federal court orders. But it's housed within the executive branch in the Department of Justice and is overseen by the Attorney General. Your court's already moved away from Marshal Service protection, as we've discussed, to build a Supreme Court police department. Answerable to the court.

Do you think other federal courts should also follow suit? Should Congress move the Marshals Service out of DOJ and into the Article III branch? Um, and do you think the judiciary's reliance on the executive branch for security and enforcement of orders creates any separation of powers concerns? I think that's another one on which we're probably not prepared to opine. I mean, I think what I will say is I, I thought as the Seventh Circuit judge and during my confirmation process, the US Marshals Service gave me great protection.

And, you know, when they were outside of our homes, we were all really grateful for the Marshal Service being there. You know, on the broader separation of powers question that you pose, I'm honestly not sure, and I don't know whether the lower courts are asking for that as well, to have in-house security and to be free of the Marshal Service. That strikes me as a more complex question that I'm not sure we could express a view about. And I do think my question had two components. One was Marshal Service as protection for federal courts and federal court officials.

The other was the enforcement of court orders. We haven't seen any problem with that recently. Um, but it struck me as a question well worth your input to the extent you're comfortable. Um, for state and local courts, uh, Senator Cornyn and I have a Countering Threats and Attacks on Our Judges Act, which would establish a state judicial threat intelligence and resource center, uh, because frankly, state and local judges many of whom have faced threats and a number of whom have tragically been killed. Um, they don't have the intelligence sharing and the, um, coordinated and professional protection resources the federal judiciary does.

Um, and, and I know you're not gonna opine on a piece of legislation, but I just, um, could you help give me any input on what you've learned about how security concerns can affect a judge's ability to make sound legal judgments? How important is the physical security of the judiciary at the state and local level to the independence and strength of our judiciary nationally. Oh gosh, Senator Coons, it's so— I mean, I'm glad to hear that you're focusing on this with Senator Cornyn, because I think it's critically important. For one thing, you're not going to attract the kind of people who you want serving in any of these positions at the state or federal level if they feel like the security of them and their families will suffer. And so just the ability to deliver the kind of justice that we hope that our courts can provide will suffer.

And then I do think that judges at both the state and federal level are holding strong despite intimidation and threats. And I think that's a tribute to our constitutional system. However, I don't know what to say about what might happen if somebody were really persistently being threatened and harassed in that kind of way. So I think we need to have our courts be able to operate independently. And safely.

I lived—. I've lived in other countries. I serve on the Foreign Relations Committee, and I am directly familiar with instances where physical threats to the families of justices and judges change the outcome of important decisions in other countries. And I won't impugn any country by reference, but it's not unheard of globally. And I think we need to guard against that happening here.

Again, Senator Cornyn and I, we've been prolific, got signed into law the Courthouse Ethics and Transparency Act, or CETA, signed in 2022. And this followed an investigation that found 130 federal judges failed to recuse themselves from matters involving parties where they held a financial interest. And it covers the whole federal judiciary, including justices. They're required to publicly publish annual disclosures. And submit periodic transaction reports for significant security trades, just as members of Congress do.

The justices are in compliance, but we have a serious compliance issue across the rest of the federal judiciary. Only a quarter of judges' disclosures were posted on the timeline required in statute, and we're still waiting for more than 200 disclosures from 2024. Um, SEED is a requirement, not a suggestion. Justice Kagan, why do you think so many judges in the federal court system are having difficulty complying, and does the judiciary need additional resources, uh, or clarification, uh, to help ensure compliance? I'm not sure what the answer to that is.

For sure you're right, Senator Coons, that compliance is of great importance in this area, and I'm glad you said that we are in compliance. I checked before I asked.

You know, I'm not sure what your bill does, so I'm not going to be able to comment on your bill. But there's no question that every judge should be in compliance with those requirements. The version that applies to Congress has a financial penalty when your disclosure is not submitted on time. The version applying to the judiciary does not. And I wondered if you thought we should harmonize the legislation.

Uh, that I'll take a pass on. Um, last point I'll make—. I just want to say, like Justice Barrett, I think it's great that you and Justice Kornan are pursuing, uh, these— or are taking seriously this— the threats to the judiciary, the threats to the rule of law, how we can make sure that the judiciary is, um, as fine as it can be. I'd welcome any follow-up that the Judicial Conference or that the court wants to make on a number of those points. Last, I'll just reference— you had a robust discussion about an ethics code, about the mandatory ethics code, and I appreciate that you're committed to enforcement and that you are recognizing the challenges within the hierarchy of Article 3.

But I do think, just speaking for myself, that there is a genuine appearance issue, and I would urge you to work diligently to find a way to deliver a judicially created but effective enforcement mechanism, um, so that some of the transparency and ethics concerns that have been raised about the court can be addressed. I'm the vice chair of the Ethics Committee in the Senate, and I think the fact that there is an enforceable ethics code that applies to every senator and Senate staff, and that we on occasion take publicly known, and much more frequently not known, actions, uh, is an important part of trying our best to preserve confidence in the institutions of our government. Thank you for your testimony today. Thank you, Senator Coons. We've been joined by the ranking member, Senator Murray.

You are recognized. Well, thank you very much, and thank you both, uh, Justice Barrett, Justice Kagan, for being here today. We appreciate it. Like everyone, I really respect the separation of powers and the importance of an impartial and independent Supreme Court. So it is important for all of us on this committee to fulfill our responsibility to oversee taxpayer dollars.

So I just want you to know I really appreciate both of you being here and participating in this hearing. I do have several questions for both of you about the court's budget and operations. But before I go to that, I do want to say I'm very troubled that the current president challenges and has challenged our system of checks and balances in very unprecedented ways. The court has made some incredibly consequential decisions without any real process or explanation by relying on the shadow docket. And it's also unbelievably important to the functioning of our democracy that we have a well-functioning, independent judiciary that is trusted by the people of this nation.

That requires transparency and it requires the American people to be able to know you are calling balls and strikes and not making decisions based on any financial conflict of interest and what is behind those decisions. So I urge you to keep those issues in mind, and if either of you have any comments on that, particularly on the shadow hearings, I would appreciate it. Justice Kagan? Um, sure. You know, this is something that we, um, uh, there are many facets to to the shadow docket, and we discuss them and debate them and sometimes disagree about them.

You know, in recent years, we have increasingly received these requests to move fast and to move before a case winds its way through all the levels of review.

And, you know, we have to decide what to do with those requests.

We argue about the standards to be used. We argue about how those standards apply in particular cases. Sometimes Justice Barrett and I have agreed. Sometimes Justice Barrett and I have disagreed. I think what, for myself, what the court is, is doing better on, but is not completely there on, is even when we feel as though an earlier decision is appropriate, finding ways to incorporate greater process into our decision of those cases.

So have oral arguments, have more briefing, make sure to explain ourselves in our decisions more than we did at, you know, maybe a year or 18 months ago when this— when we first started being swamped with these applications. I think we can still improve what we're doing. I think you're exactly right that transparency is important, that people need to know, lower court judges need to know, litigants need to know, the public needs to know what it is that we're deciding and why. There are occasions where emergency relief is absolutely appropriate, and it's finding those occasions but no others that is the challenge of this. Okay, I appreciate that response, and don't know if you have anything to add.

I'll just add one thing. I think one of the challenges, you know, as we're trying to adapt and respond to the number and character of applications that we receive, I think one of the challenges is on our merits docket, we have a very well-established process for handling cases, and each case is treated the exact same way, the same deadlines, the same briefing limits, oral argument, etc. And as Justice Kagan alluded to, it's a little bit different with these emergency applications because I don't think any of us takes the position that we should have an opinion written for every one of them or oral argument for every one of them. So it's not quite the same one-size-fits-all process on the emergency docket that we have on the merits docket. And so I think what we're working on now is figuring out which ones do warrant that more process, the oral argument, more briefing, um, and which ones should be handled in-house, which ones warrant more explanation, which ones really should be just an order.

And I think that has been something that we're just working through. Well, I, I encourage you strongly to work through through that and make it clear. I think especially at this time, whether it comes to trust or transparency or truthfulness, the public needs to know. And I think you need to recognize that this is a serious question that many of our constituents have. So please continue your work and, and reach a goal that I think everybody would support you on.

So thank you. Now, on your budget request, this committee does take security threats facing the Supreme Court and everyone who signed up to serve the public extremely seriously. That's exactly why Congress provided $58 million in additional security funding in FY 26 to address some of these increased, um, threats and vulnerabilities. Unfortunately, however, the court made a request for over half of this funding at the very last minute without any public explanation or justification of the need for that funding after we had already provided $28 million in the continuing resolution last fall. So I just want to ask both of you, will you commit to making public all relevant budget request documents in the future, including for any unanticipated supplemental funding needs?

Um, absolutely. We want to be transparent. And, you know, Justice Kagan had apologized to Ranking Member Reid on the court's behalf if we did anything that was suboptimal in our seeking of those funds. You know, uh, they were in response. We made those requests in response to unexpected, uh, unexpected needs like the premature— we didn't expect the marshals to stop, drop residential security as quickly as they did, and they told us that they were going to end at 6 months before we anticipated it.

That was one of the big line item reasons for seeking that extra money. So it's my understanding that our staff was transparent with the committee about what the money was being spent on. But, you know, absolutely, you know, we want to cooperate and we recognize your important role. Okay, I, I think that's really important for you to understand and make sure that we have that documentation. We're— we are— our constituents require us to be very transparent about where their tax dollars go, and we need that budget information from you.

And we want to make sure the court has first-rate security, but we do have very little information about how you are actually building this type of security capacity that you need. So standing up your own police and residential security is not an easy task. How long do you think it will take to fully be fully staffed and operational? And secondly, what expertise are you relying on to make sure your security personnel have the facilities and the training and the capacity they need? What we think— we have a goal of 477 police officers.

We're a ways away from that right now. If we include people we get through contracting, we can probably do it within a couple of years. But in, in order to have our own employees get up to that mark, then we're probably talking more like 6 years, you know, into the 2030s. And, you know, as, as to what kind of training is being used, I think we're going to have to Unless Justice Barrett knows more than I do, I think we're going to have to provide you with further information about that. You know, I'm confident that the kind of training programs that we've put in place are good ones, but I can't give you a whole lot of detail about that.

Okay. That is something that we need to have in order to provide the budget for you, so we would appreciate that back. And finally, I just have a few seconds left. I heard Senator Coons, when I come in, talk about code of ethics, and I just want to reiterate that.

As my colleagues have pointed out, that code is self-enforced, and it is a weaker code of conduct than one all the lower courts have been held to. For example, it essentially allows justices to decide for themselves whether or not they are engaging in a political activity or accepting inappropriate gifts. I know you've been asked this both in the House and a number of people here have mentioned it, but I want to add my name and voice to the fact that we need and our constituents need to know that you have a code of ethics, that it is— you are held to high standards because that, again, is about transparency and it is about returning confidence to the court decisions that are being made. So I appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you, Senator. Thank you, Senator Murray. Senator Hustad, you are recognized. Thank you, Chair Fischer. To the justices, thank you very much for being here today.

You debated whether it's better to be on that side or on this side, and I will tell you, as having been a petitioner before the court in 2018, it's much better to be on this side. And I think that you've made a strong case for your security, the funding for your security requests. I think we all have a growing concern about security issues with the court, justifiably so. I hope that we will get a budget done and we will get an appropriations bill passed and settle on these top-line discussions so that it doesn't set the stage for another government shutdown. So I'm hopeful that this is one of the many issues that we can get agreement on and get a and get a bill passed.

In talking about any problem, I always try to look at the root cause. What is the root cause of the problem that we're trying to address? And I know that issues regarding fiery rhetoric through venues like social media have been attributable to some of the increased security threats. I was wondering as well Have you seen any of these threats from, from the information you have as organized threats, either domestically or internationally, uh, that, um, would lead to some of these increased security threats? And, uh, Justice Kagan, I'll start with you, and Justice Coney Barrett, please follow up if you have any thoughts.

You know, our sense of the threats is that it's more lone actors. Um, but, um, you know, perhaps I think that's one that our staff, if, if you would like more information in a SCIF or a private meeting, because I think they do know some things about some of the sources of the threats, but probably not something we should say in a public setting. Okay, I appreciate that, and we will follow up and try to get more information on that because I think it could help further make the case for why this is an important, an important issue.

In, in the cases of these security cases and the threats and things like that, do you believe that they're intentionally designed to intimidate you to alter or change the opinions of the court? It's hard to see how some of them are not designed I think they're designed to intimidate or designed maybe to punish after decisions, you know, that the person sending the threat didn't like as a warning not to do it in the future. It's hard to interpret, particularly those anonymous deliveries that are sent in the name of Judge Salas's murdered son, as anything other than an attempt to intimidate and influence decisions.

Decisions. Um, the, uh, the issue on the, the Dobbs opinion, there was— that was leaked.

Um, do you— are we any closer to knowing how that happened? And are you satisfied with the efforts to find out how that leak occurred? Well, we did a serious internal investigation and could not come to a conclusion about that issue. And, um, It's not that we've closed the books on it. If there is— if we get any further information, you know, we will pursue it till the end.

And I know that the marshal of the court who was in charge of that investigation feels that that is her responsibility. As to whether it will happen, I don't know. Okay. Okay.

The, um, we know this is one of the responsibilities I think we all have as public officials is to, to, uh, watch our rhetoric, uh, and how we describe things. And, uh, it certainly, uh, it certainly hasn't gotten better. There's no doubt about that. And the words that people choose can be very inflammatory. But also the words that are sometimes chosen in judicial opinions have seemingly, to me, grown rather inflammatory on occasion, and not necessarily with the Supreme Court, but at all levels of the courts.

Are you concerned about that? Is there any discussion about the words that are used in coming up with legal opinions that may indeed contribute to the problem? I think that, you know, all justices and judges write their own opinions. I would say, you know, speaking for, you know, myself and my sense of how judges think about this generally, is that our goal is to disagree about ideas without crossing the line into the personal. And in my own experience, and the experience of the judges with whom I've served, you know, I think that is a line that judges try not to cross.

Because one thing I think that the courts, not just the Supreme Court, but courts generally can model for the public is the way to have disagreements that can be very serious about weighty issues and that can be sharp, but that avoid descending into that kind of unhelpful rhetoric that gets very personal. That, that is exactly the way I feel about it. Um, when I dissent, I, um, especially in an important case, in which I care about a great deal and other people do as well. I want it to be a strong dissent. I want it to be a pointed dissent.

I want people to understand why it is that I'm taking the trouble to dissent, but I don't want it to be a personal dissent. I don't want to do anything that is ad hominem with respect to my colleagues. And, you know, people can make mistakes. I can make mistakes with respect to that.

I like it when one of my colleagues calls me and says, Elena, take out that line, you know? And I think we do do that for each other, and I think that that's a good practice. I appreciate you sharing that because I think it's important. Look, you are the highest court in the land. People look, they hold you up, they hold you in esteem, and what happens at the court is very, very important in setting the tone, just as we have that responsibility too.

I think it's, it's a collective responsibility that we can all discuss being here in this hearing today about how we can all get better at doing this, because it's, it's collectively contributes to this environment that I think we're all struggling through right now. Uh, let me, um, just finish up with a, with some cybersecurity. Uh, how How, uh, I know that some of the, the money they're requesting is for cybersecurity. Um, explain the context for what threats you're experiencing there, how that impacts the court. We received, was the number, north of 200 million, um, attempts to breach the system, and that's, you know, on track to practically double this year.

AI is making it easier for people to find vulnerabilities and, and, and all entities' systems and to exploit that. So we're trying to keep up. We would like to have 12 new cybersecurity experts, um, and the, the goal is to try to keep our systems safe so that they cannot be penetrated. Some of the lower courts have had debilitating breaches of security, and we want to prevent that from happening to us. And of course, it can compromise all kinds of confidential information, confidential witnesses.

It can endanger national security. So we take that very seriously. I'm frankly amazed that we've done as well as we have up till now. If you think about the number of people who want to know what we say before we say it, the number of people who, you know, millions and billions of dollars depend on it, other, you know, other nations might want to receive information before we publicly announce it. It's sort of amazing to me that we've done as well as we have.

But we don't want to, you know, we want to make sure that that success record continues. Great. Well, thank you for being here. I think your presence for Congress today, Senate, is helpful to both the court, the Senate, and the country. So thank you.

Thank you, Senator. Senator Fischer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I, too, want to thank you both for being here today. You don't have to be here, so we appreciate you coming forward to help us have a better understanding of the threats that you face and the budget, uh, the resources you need to make sure you address those threats.

I know that, uh, the court has expanded its personal protection mission in recent years in response to an uptick in those threats to, to yourselves, to your families, and to the court building. Itself. Uh, the president, vice president, uh, cabinet members, um, congressional leadership, other dignities, they all receive a level of personal protection, uh, that meets the threat environment that they face. Do you believe that it's important for the court to rely on personal protection structure as comprehensive and consistently resourced as those of comparable officials in other branches? I do.

You know, I would refer back to what Justice Kagan said about when this all got started in 2016, and Congressman pointed out that our security was not even as great as that provided to the director of OPM. I think— I wish I didn't need the security that I need now, because as Justice Gagan also said earlier, it's more pleasant to travel around without security, but I do think that we need that. And right now our details range between 4 and 8 permanent members of a detail depending on the justice. It's my understanding that cabinet level is more up at around 20, 20 to 22, to try to prevent burnout and that sort of a thing. So I do think it's, it's not feasible to manage this round-the-clock kind of protection with a detail of 4 to 8 people.

When you look at the level of the threat that you're facing personally, do you believe that, um, justices should receive, uh, select, uh, Secret Service level type protection? When you say there can be up to 20 for a cabinet member, do you believe that that has to increase for you as well personally? And then you tie in your residents, your families. I mean, I think the important thing is to have the, um, the level of protection be appropriate for us, and however that compares to the president is less important. So, you know, it's not like we have to equal the Secret Service or anything.

What we need is the level of protection that we think will make us secure. And you have that? Do you have that now? I think that's what we're working towards. As Justice Barrett said, if you think that our personnel details are 4 to 8.

There's a lot of overtime involved in those 4 to 8 people. There's a, there's a danger of burnout. We really would like them more like 12, and I think at that point our security experts have decided that that would be the appropriate level for us and, and a level that keeps us secure. I should add, when I said that number, that's counting the residential security that's allocated to each Justice, I wasn't referring just to those who are with, with the Justices during the day. But it is true, sometimes, you know, I'll go someplace to an event or something that there will be Cabinet members at, or, and, and I drive up in my one car, and there are 5 cars outside for a single Cabinet member.

So even now, I think that we are, we have less protection. Than some. And I know that you are, um, really facing a lot of institutional headwinds as well at this time, whether it's the philosophical attacks, uh, on the jurisprudence that you have, the institutional design of the court itself, and even, uh, questioning the institutional legitimacy of the court. And I believe Justice, uh, Coney Barrett, you talked about the earlier in response to a question, you mentioned the threats to the institution. And while I happen to think those are really grave, grave threats to the institution itself, I think what we, what we're looking at here are the physical threats that you personally are facing.

Can you, um, Justice Kagan, can you describe the importance of the security of the court? And, um, when we, when we do hear rhetoric about the legitimacy of the court, how does that personally affect each of you when that, when the court's being attacked, but in effect you are? Yeah, I mean, I think the excessive rhetoric comes from all over the place, and it comes from members of each political party, and that is incredibly unfortunate for reasons that we've talked about before, that, you know, criticism is fair game. Everybody has a right to criticize the court. There are plenty of things the court does that the people can criticize.

But where it's, uh, it, it becomes intimidation, where it becomes, um, incitement to violence, that's where the line is crossed. And, um, and, uh, serious people should know not to, uh, make statements like that. Correct. Um, I wanted to ask you about, uh, the cybersecurity of the, of the court and your leadership role, how that plays out among all the federal courts with cybersecurity. Do you have a pattern of what you're doing to make sure you can have secure— a secure court there?

It is national security on what you're doing. How do you implement that at lower levels? We are on a different computer system than the lower courts, and I know the lower courts are in desperate need of upgrading their computer systems, and they have been really attacked. And, and I think in large part it's because these systems are so outdated. And so I know that in their budget request is additional monies to try to improve the cybersecurity of their systems.

Because we're on a different system, we don't have— we don't share the same informational systems. Our cybersecurity operates just differently. So I'm not sure, I'm not the cybersecurity expert, and we can have staff follow up with you, but I'm not sure that what we implemented, apart from things like best practices, would translate exactly into the lower court context. I'm assuming that you are seeing increased threats from foreign actors at the court. There are.

As we are across government, across across business. Are you in the process right now of transforming your cybersecurity to address possible attacks there? I think our cybersecurity is designed to strengthen it across the board from no matter where the threats come. I do know that some of them have come from foreign actors, but I know that some of this information— first of all, it's beyond what I have access to at the moment, and some of it may be sensitive, but I think it's important for you to know it. And so our staff can follow up with you in a private setting or in a SCIF and give you some details about the kinds of threats that we've had.

I'd appreciate that. Thank you both again for being here. Senator Van Hollen. Uh, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, Justice Kagan, Justice Barrett, thank you for your, your service.

And I know you testified on the House earlier and you've answered a lot of questions here, and so a lot of territory has been covered. I do want to circle back on a couple points. One is public trust in the courts, in our public institutions, because I, I do think that trust is vital to the public support of law in a functioning democracy. And I'm well aware of the fact that Congress's public standing is pretty low, but it's also true that public confidence in the Supreme Court has been sinking dramatically. In recent times.

Uh, there are lots of factors, uh, for that. I do think a contributing factor is the lack of a framework, enforceable framework for your code of conduct. And of course, the Supreme Court adopted a code of conduct a number of years ago. But as you've both testified, there's currently no enforcement framework. And Justice Kagan, it's been pointed out that A few years ago, you argued that as a personal matter, uh, for yourself, you thought that the court should proceed to maybe— and I'm quoting— appoint some committee of highly respected judges with a great deal of experience, with a reputation of fairness, um, that kind of solution.

Has any progress been made since you made that statement by the court in trying to establish that kind of system? Maybe you can give us a progress report. If there is any, on trying to put that in place? Well, I do still believe that for reasons that I've expressed earlier in the day. I think we continue to talk about the issue amongst ourselves, and, you know, I couldn't really say, you know, what the nature of those conversations are.

That wouldn't be fair to my colleagues. But I think it remains a non-resolved question. Okay. Well, as a a cosponsor of what we call the CERD Act here. Um, I, I hope you act before Congress does.

I'd like to see the Supreme Court act on its own, but I do think there needs to be an enforceable framework, and I believe at some point there'll be the votes to do that if the Supreme Court doesn't do it itself. On a, on a related sort of question of public confidence, I want to ask you about prediction markets, because prediction markets have faced very little federal oversight. They're largely self-regulating. We've already seen insider trading by government officials in other branches and in the military. Supreme Court justices and their staff have access to similar information.

They're not immune from this trend. Here are some of the event contracts that are currently being offered on, on CASHI. Who will be the next Supreme Court justice? Will Trump be held liable for January 6th and any court? Will the independence of the judiciary be weakened during Trump's term?

Now, clearly, members of the Senate and Senate staff could have information that could be helpful to them in playing the prediction markets. The Senate actually has now adopted, as a matter of Senate rules, a prohibition on doing that. So my question to you is, will the court do the same, both for justices and for the staff? Of the Supreme Court. That's already covered.

My understanding is it's already—. It's already covered because there's a prohibition on, um, using information that you know within the court, um, to make financial gain. And so—. And not just for justices, but for all employees of the court. Okay, so it's your view that the current language of the rules already prohibits every member of the court staff and obviously the members of the court itself from engaging in prediction markets.

I mean, I think this is an incredibly important area, so if your charge to us is go back and look for any loopholes, we'll willingly take on it. Yeah, I would, I would suggest you—. We don't want loopholes, Senator Benham. This is super important. Yeah, I appreciate that.

Well, there's legislation that's been, I think, just introduced in the House, so I think there may be a feeling that the current language may not be airtight. So if you could go back and, and look at that, I'd appreciate it. Um, in terms of the, um, shadow docket, and I followed some of your testimony in the House side, I saw Justice Kagan, you thought some improvements have been made. I think it remains a fact that during the last session of the court, more decisions were made on the so-called shadow docket than through the normal process. And I do think there big issues here, um, and I'm wondering, and I'm not obviously asking about any particular case, but I am wondering about the precedential weight of a decision on the rocket docket.

Now, just in the last couple days, we've seen two people killed, um, by ICE agents, one in Texas, one in Maine. In shootings. These are people who they were trying to apprehend for being here illegally. I see that ICE just halted most traffic stop arrests in the wake of these fatal shootings. That's today's news.

I'm, I'm glad to hear that. Um, but I do recall that one of the cases that was decided on the so-called shadow docket has become the known— is the case with the, quote, Kavanaugh stops, whether fair or not fair. That's what it's known as. And so I guess my question to you is, when you— when the Supreme Court makes a decision in the normal course, it is binding precedent. What is the nature of the precedent or the weight that lower courts should give to a shadow docket decision?

So I think it's a complicated question. I think you've put your finger on, on something real here, that there are some conflicting statements in our own precedent as to exactly what the precedent what the potential weight is. At most, it is, you know, usually when we decide cases on the shadow docket, we're talking about the likely prospects of success, not that something will succeed, but that a claim is likely to succeed. So how one takes a ruling like that and converts it into binding precedent is, I think, a complicated question, and I think that the, Court itself has been of a little bit mixed mind on that question. Um, and, and so I, I think it's a completely fair, uh, inquiry and, um, and one that we need to keep thinking about and keep on top of.

If I could just follow up. Um, so in a normal case, you make a decision, you the Supreme Court, as to whether or not to grant cert or not.. And when you deny cert, you don't issue an opinion. There's implication, I thought, from some of your testimony earlier that you're somehow required to take up a case on the shadow docket because they're more of an emergency nature. But there's no requirement that you take it up, is there?

Oh, it's not. It's not that we're required to grant relief, but there are motions filed. And so every motion has to be either granted or denied. So we don't have discretion to just take a pass and say we're not going to act on it. But in some sense, when you deny cert, you're, you're making a decision on the merits.

And so I guess what I just want to leave you with is that when you grant these shadow docket motions, aren't you maybe creating an incentive for more people to file those motions? Because— as I said, you've now got a situation where you're actually rendering more decisions through that shadow docket process than through the normal process. It's almost as if you're saying that if there's automatic cert in the sense that you have to make a decision, I would argue that denying cert is a decision too, um, because someone's looking for relief on the merits. Supreme Court's denying cert. So, when you're taking up these shadow docket cases, you're also making a decision to both take it up and at the same time either deny it or grant relief.

This is part of what you say that I agree with and part that I don't. I mean, I think, um, you know, every cert petition, we'll deny it or we'll grant it. So we make a decision either way. Every application for emergency relief, we either deny it or we grant it. We make a decision either way, and we have to do that.

You can't just sort of put it in a box and say we're not— we're just going to ignore that. I think, and, and I'm, I'm not sure where the number comes from, uh, that we make more decisions on the shadow docket than we do ordinarily, because I think some of those are probably just ones— they came here, we looked at them, we said we have no interest in doing this on the emergency docket, goodbye. And if that's being counted as part of what you're talking about, you know, well, we're just denying it. Yeah. Um, but I do think I mean, I think the part of your question that I think is a fair criticism is to ask why it is that we're facing so many more of these petitions.

I think partly, it's the nature of governmental action and how governmental action has changed and what kind of challenges governmental action prompts, provokes, but I think partly, It's, uh, that we've granted a number of these, and so people know that it's available, relief on the emergency docket. And when people know that relief is available, there are a lot of smart lawyers out there in the world who are going to say, why don't we take our shot at that? Um, and so the, the, the greater percentage of these that we grant, the more likely it is that people would just think of this as part of the normal process of litigating. Hey, let's just file an emergency motion. And that's very different from what it was when I joined the court 15 years ago.

Yeah, just in closing, Justice Kagan, that, that if you could look at that, I'd like to keep in touch on that. That is my concern. And that is also part of my question about what's the precedential value, right? If you have an incentive for more people to file these cases, and at least until final decision is rendered, maybe it's years down the line. People are going to look at this shadow docket decision as something that has influence and weight.

Whether they should or not, we'll have to figure out. But I do worry because it creates this zone of, of uncertainty. And I also think it undermines confidence in the system. Thank you. Thank you, Senator Van Hollen.

And I want to thank the two justices today for being here. We appreciate your time and your attention. I'll remind all of our members that we have one week to submit any questions for the record. And I would ask the justices, if you might, to respond as quickly as possible to those questions as they come. With that, this subcommittee meeting is adjourned.