Supreme Court Justices Warn Threats Are Closing In, Seek Major Security Increase

Amy Coney Barrett recounts bulletproof vest, swatting attack as court confronts surging physical and cyber threats

by Emmitt Barry, Worthy News Washington D.C. Bureau Chief

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Worthy News) – Supreme Court Justices Amy Coney Barrett and Elena Kagan made a rare appearance before Congress on Tuesday, warning that escalating threats against the nation’s highest court are placing justices, their families and judicial independence at growing risk.

Barrett offered lawmakers a deeply personal glimpse into that danger, recalling the day she carried a bulletproof vest into her home and was forced to explain it to her 12-year-old son.

“I didn’t expect that performing this service was going to put me in the position of explaining to my children what a bulletproof vest was, and why I had to wear one,” Barrett told lawmakers.

She also described a recent “swatting” incident in which someone falsely reported gunshots and a disturbance at her home, prompting local police to respond. Supreme Court officers stationed outside intercepted the responding authorities and prevented the potentially deadly misunderstanding from escalating.

Barrett said justices have also received intimidating deliveries at their homes, some placed in the name of Daniel Anderl, the 20-year-old son of federal Judge Esther Salas who was murdered when he answered the door to an attacker in 2020.

The message behind such deliveries, Barrett said, was unmistakable.

The justices appeared before House and Senate appropriators to defend the Supreme Court’s fiscal year 2027 budget request. It marked the first time sitting justices had testified before Congress on the court’s budget since 2019.

The court is requesting approximately $228 million, roughly 10% above current spending. About $14.6 million would be used to expand personal protection, including additional agents assigned to each justice and 25 more Supreme Court police and security personnel.

Kagan warned that reported threats against the justices rose 25% last year and are expected to climb another 38% this year.

“For some of us, those threats have come very close, and all of us live with the knowledge that they may again materialize,” she said.

The court is also seeking additional cybersecurity personnel as foreign and domestic actors dramatically increase attempts to penetrate its computer systems.

Although security dominated the hearings, the justices also discussed the court’s ethics code and its handling of emergency cases, sometimes called the “shadow docket.”

Kagan said the justices continue to debate whether the court’s code of conduct should have a formal enforcement mechanism. The current system largely leaves compliance to the individual justices.

She also acknowledged that the court has sometimes sent mixed signals about whether emergency rulings — frequently issued without full briefing or oral arguments — are binding on lower courts. Kagan said the justices are working to provide more explanation in consequential emergency decisions.

Lawmakers from both parties voiced support for strengthening court security while condemning inflammatory rhetoric directed at judges.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, warned that elected officials from both parties have helped create a climate in which personal attacks can develop into genuine threats.

Criticism of judicial decisions is legitimate in a constitutional republic, Kagan said, but attempts to frighten judges into changing their rulings cross a dangerous line.

“Criticism of the court is fair game,” she said. “But intimidation is a different thing entirely.”

The dangers became especially clear following the 2022 leak of the court’s draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which ultimately overturned Roe v. Wade and returned abortion policy to the states.

Threats surged afterward, and an armed man later traveled to Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s Maryland home with plans to assassinate him. The man was arrested and is now serving a prison sentence.

The testimony underscored an increasingly serious challenge for America’s constitutional system: judges must remain accountable to the law, but they must also remain free to decide cases without fear that political anger will place their spouses and children in danger.

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