The Jenny Beth Show

Protecting the Supreme Court from a Progressive Takeover | Roman Buhler, KeepNine.org

Episode Summary

Jenny Beth sits down with Roman Buhler who is heading up the 'Keep Nine' initiative to prevent the progressive left from changing the number of justices and packing the Supreme Court.

Episode Notes

Jenny Beth sits down with Roman Buhler who is heading up the 'Keep Nine' initiative to prevent the progressive left from changing the number of justices and packing the Supreme Court.

www.keepnine.org

Twitter/X: @RomanBuhler1 | @jennybethm

Episode Transcription

Roman Buhler (00:00):

We ask Democrats who say they're for democracy, will you support a constitutional amendment that permanently requires regulations to be approved by Congress? We're going to expose a lot of phonies

Jenny Beth Martin (00:10):

On the left. Well, they say they want to save democracy, but they actually want to destroy it. Yeah, they really do. Keeping

Narrator (00:16):

Our republicanism on the line and it requires Patriots with great passion, dedication, and eternal vigilance to preserve our freedoms. Jenny Beth Martin is the co-founder of Tea Party Patriots. She's an author, a filmmaker, and one of time magazine's most influential people in the world. But the title she's most proud of is Mom To Her Boy, girl Twins. She has been at the forefront fighting to protect America's core principles for more than a decade. Welcome to the Jenny Beth Show.

Jenny Beth Martin (00:48):

This episode of the Jenny Be Show was recorded on Radio Row at Turning Point Actions Restoring National Confidence Summit in Las Vegas. My next guest is focused on protecting the Supreme Court from the left's constant threats to pack the court as soon as they get the chance. Buhler is heading up the Keep nine Initiative, which is a constitutional amendment that would lock in nine justices on the Supreme Court. Ramon also served as committee counsel on key committees in the House of Representatives. The Supreme Court is so important and court packing is something that we've been concerned about. I want you to understand what that is and what you're working on. So Roman, what is it?

Roman Buhler (01:28):

Well, the Cape nine Amendment would be the shortest amendment ever to the United States Constitution. All it says is the Supreme Court of the United States shall be composed of non justices. Now, why do we need this? We need it because several years ago, democrats got mad because for the first time in a generation, Republicans and conservatives had a majority on the Supreme Court. So in the Democrat Rule book, if you lose, you change the rules, you break the rules. So there is now an effort very close to success by Democrats to passing law that would expand the number of Supreme Court justices so the next Democratic president could appoint four new justices and put a progressive majority on the Supreme Court. I don't have to tell your listeners what a disaster that would be for constitutional law in America. If the court becomes a puppet of politicians who can pack it anytime they want, we no longer have an independent Supreme Court.

(02:27):

Imagine the Super Bowl. If the referees were all appointed by the home team, there would be no game. And so the left basically doesn't want the Supreme Court to act as a check and balance on their abusive power. They want the Supreme Court to enable their abusive power. Our problem is that we can't stop them from packing the court just by winning elections because we probably can't win every election for the next 20 years. So working with Ed, me, who some of your listeners may know who was Reagan's general several years ago, we came up with the idea of on a constitutional amendment that would set the Supreme Court at non justices. And with Ed Me's advice and help, we were able to recruit a Democrat, a Democrat, to lead this effort, a former attorney General of Virginia by the name of Andy Miller. And then we were able to recruit a Democrat to introduce this amendment in the United States Congress, Colin Peterson from Minnesota Today, there were more than 200 members of Congress led by Ted Cruz in the Senate and by a congressman named Dusty Johnson from South Dakota in the House, 200 members of Congress who support this amendment.

(03:42):

The scary thing is that there isn't a single Democrat in Congress who has yet supported this amendment. So if you saw a gang outside your house in the middle of the night and you said to them, what are your intentions? And they said, well, we're not burglars, but we don't want to outlaw burglary. And all options are on the table, you'd know exactly what was going to happen. And when you talk to Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi and you ask them, what do you think about expanding the size of the Supreme Court? They say all options are on the table, so we should be terrified.

Jenny Beth Martin (04:19):

How many votes would it take to pass for the amendment to pass?

Roman Buhler (04:24):

Well, there's a race going on in Congress. It only takes the Democrats a majority, 50 Senators plus a tiebreaker plus 218 in the house plus a presidential signature to pack the court. We've got a much more difficult job in the long run. We've got to get two thirds of the house and two thirds of the Senate and then three quarters of the states. But here's what we want to do in 2024, which is achievable. The Democrats know that packing the court is one of the most unpopular parts of their agenda. So in 2022, all the Democrats in close races, almost all of them said, we're not for court packing. So what we need to do in 2024 is ask Democrats who say they're against court packing, starting with President Biden and going down to Democrats running for the Senate in key states and members of Congress. Well, if you're not for court packing, where do you stand on the amendment to ban it? Which by the way was first introduced by a Democrat. And when they give you an evasive answer, you know that these folks are closet court packers. And if we can expose Democrats in 2024, it's closet court packers, a lot of them will lose. And if we can continue to defeat Democrats because they won't support the amendment sooner or later, Democrats will come to their senses and will get enough support to support to get the amendment proposed.

Jenny Beth Martin (05:44):

Has this ever been talked about before with court? Has court packing ever been talked about before in our country's history? And if it has been, when did that happen? So

Roman Buhler (05:53):

There's a fascinating history of court packing. For the first 75 years of our Republic, political parties regularly added justices to increase their majority. Jefferson did it, Andrew Jackson did it, even Abraham Lincoln did it. But people realized in the last, during the Civil War, we changed the number of justices three times and people said, wait a minute, this is not the right way to do things. So for the last 150 years, there has been a tradition that the Supreme Court stays at nine. And Franklin Roosevelt tried to change that in 1937 at the peak of his power. And the country said, no president shouldn't have that much power. President should not be able to control the Supreme Court. And he lost. And people thought, well, that's it. It's never going to happen again. But the modern American left is so desperate for power. They are so desperate to overturn the Dobbs decision and restore abortion rights to their friends. They're so desperate to curb religious freedom. They're so desperate to uphold the power of the administrative state and the bureaucrats, and they're so desperate to impose a wealth tax that they have decided that Supreme Court packing is their next step. And that's our problem.

Jenny Beth Martin (07:14):

Roman, we just jumped right into court packing and keep the nine and all of that. Who are you? Tell the people who you are and what your history is.

Roman Buhler (07:26):

Well, I was a grassroots activist in California for 20 years, and you can talk to people in California and there's some people who love me and some people hate my guts, but that's okay because if you're not fighting for something hard, you don't make

Jenny Beth Martin (07:38):

Enemies.

Roman Buhler (07:38):

I got hired was complete surprise to me. I got hired by Newt Gingrich in 1989 to serve as the Republican Committee Council on election integrity for Republicans in the House of Representatives. And I served in that position for 14 years, fighting Democrat efforts to corrupt American elections. It was an incredible lesson in the long-term plans of the left to steal elections in America. And after that 14 years, I decided that problems that we needed to solve couldn't be solved from Washington. Too many politicians in Washington who just want to enhance their own power and what we need is a movement in America to do what frankly what President Trump talked about in his inaugural address in 2017, which is to take power out of Washington and give it back to the people. So with the help of some other conservatives, I put together a group called the Madison Coalition, which works to restore a balance of state and federal power.

(08:37):

And one of our first projects was something that's actually in the 2016 Republican platform. It's called the Regulation Freedom Amendment. And it would require that major new federal regulations be approved by Congress. And I hope if we win the 2024 elections, we can actually make this amendment an issue in American politics and confront Americans with the choice. Do you want a democracy or do you want to be ruled by bureaucracy? And if we ask Democrats who say they're for democracy, will you support a constitutional amendment that permanently requires regulations to be approved by Congress? We're going to expose a lot of phonies

Jenny Beth Martin (09:15):

On the left. Well, they say they want to save democracy, but they actually

Roman Buhler (09:19):

Want to destroy

Jenny Beth Martin (09:19):

It. Yeah, they really do.

Roman Buhler (09:21):

They want the country to be ruled by bureaucrats. They want to bankrupt the country so that currency is worth nothing and they want to corrupt the Supreme Court. You cannot have a democracy if you don't have an independent referee.

Jenny Beth Martin (09:33):

Right. And just to be clear, we're a representative democracy or a republic. A

Roman Buhler (09:36):

Republic. It cannot be a constitution. A republic means there are some things that politicians can't do. There are limits on their power. And the Democrats disagree with that. That's why they like to call this a democracy, not a republic because they don't want limits on their power.

Jenny Beth Martin (09:53):

Exactly. So where can people go to get information if they, and let's say that they talk to a Democrat or anyone running for office right now and they hear what they have to say about the potential amendment to keep the nine. Where would they report that and what would they do?

Roman Buhler (10:10):

So the website to go to is really simple. It's keep nine and you can use the number or spell out nine, keep nine.org. And if you go to keep nine.org put in your address and it'll automatically send an email to us and then we can be in touch with you about things that you can do in your state, in your community, in your congressional district. We need people in every single congressional district in this country to do three things. One, ask the people you can vote for President, Senate, congress, state legislature, governor, attorney General, where do you stand on the Keep nine Amendment to ban court packing? That's the first thing. Second thing is once you get some information from us, help us to spread the word about this really important amendment to save our republic. And the third thing you can do, most important thing, ask other people to do those first two things.

(11:05):

Become a recruiter and a leader. And if you want to become a speaker for this effort, you want to be more involved, go to that website, check in, send us an email, and we can get you involved in whatever way you want to be. What you're doing with Tea Party Patriots is the most incredible, one of the most incredible things that's happened in American history. A group of grassroots people who want to take their country back from the politicians and give it back to the people and hopefully we can be a part of what you're

Jenny Beth Martin (11:33):

Doing. Well, thank you very much. I want to just hone in on one thing before we close out. You made a very important point. You said they need to be asking this question about whether they want to keep nine on the Supreme Court or not of senators and congressmen, but it doesn't stop there and it's important to understand why. Remember you said it has to pass with a super majority out of Congress and it has to go back and be ratified by the states, which means then it's got to get through the state legislative body. So you've got to ask your state reps, your state senators, do governors need to sign off on it as well?

Roman Buhler (12:08):

Governors don't need to sign off, nor do attorneys general, but they command the public podium. If a governor in a state says this is important, and we've in fact had 19 state legislative chambers already pass resolutions urging Congress to propose this amendment. So if your state hasn't passed, if the legislators in your state haven't introduced or passed a resolution, you can be helpful. And if the legislators in your state have done it, we need them to talk about it. People know that there's a court packing threat. How many people know that there's a Keep nine Amendment if we make the Keep nine Amendment a household word like Obamacare was a household word or the Patriot Act was a household word, public pressure will do the rest,

Jenny Beth Martin (12:55):

Right? I think that people should also just go ahead and ask on down the line, ask your county commission candidates and even your school board candidates. Now that that seems weird to someone who's listening to this right now because going, my school district doesn't affect it.

Roman Buhler (13:11):

No, this affects your school board.

Jenny Beth Martin (13:14):

But a lot of times those are the people who move up into legislative body. So let's say that they get elected to school board today and two years from now they're in the legislature. Legislature. If you don't know where they stand, they may be the ones voting to ratify it or not.

Roman Buhler (13:28):

So let me suppose you're running for school board or you ask a school board member, well, where do you stand on this amendment to ban Supreme Court packing? And they say, well, I'm here to talk about education, not the Supreme Court. Well, you might be interested to know that the most dangerous group that opposes parental control of schools is the National Education Association. And the National Education Association recently changed their platform to support packing the Supreme Court. And the reason is that the Supreme Court recently decided that the teacher's unions cannot collect dues from people who aren't members. And the teacher's union know that if they packed a court, they can reverse that decision and unleash the spigot and send hundreds of millions of dollars back down to the grassroots corrupt to defeat all our candidates. So this is an educational issue. And again, another issue is that there's a case pending before the Supreme Court that would make every school that gets a tax exemption for donations would make it into a federally controlled school so they could force it to unionize. So this control of the Supreme Court is what the left wants because they want control of your local school district. So this is really important. If people are interested and if people want more details, they can go to web website. I will also give you our email if people want to email me directly, it's leaders@keepnine.org, leaders@keepnine.org, you can email me. My name is Ramon Bueller, I'd be happy to talk to anybody who's listening to this program. If you're listening, you're part of the grassroots movement that's going to save this country.

Jenny Beth Martin (15:13):

Well, this is perfect. Thank you so much for joining us today. And it's keep nine.com.

Roman Buhler (15:17):

Keep kind.org

Jenny Beth Martin (15:18):

Oh.org. Keep nine org and it can be keep nine the number or keep nine NIN e.org. Be sure to check it out. Start asking the people who are running for office in your local area where they stand on the Keep nine Amendment.

Narrator (15:31):

The Jenny Beth Show is hosted by Jenny Beth Martin, produced by Kevin Han and directed by Luke Livingston. The Jenny Beth Show is a production of Tea Party Patriots action. For more information, visit tea party patriots.org.

Jenny Beth Martin (15:51):

If you like this episode, let me know by hitting the light button or leaving a comment or a five star review. And if you want to be the first to know every time we drop a new episode, be sure to subscribe and turn on notifications for whichever platform you're listening on. If you do these simple things, it will help the podcast grow and I'd really appreciate it. Thank you so much.