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Conservatives Say Biden's 'Court Packing' Commission Could Undo 150+ Years of Supreme Court Precedent

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ABOVE:  John Malcolm, vice president for the Institute for Constitutional Government at The Heritage Foundation, appeared on Monday's edition of CBN News's Faith Nation to discuss the commission appointed by President Biden to study the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Republican politicians and conservatives are blasting President Biden's new commission to study overhauling the U.S. Supreme Court.

The bipartisan group will spend the next six months examining the structure of the high court as critics on the left complain that they think President Trump made the court too conservative.

The White House released a statement Friday revealing that members of the commission will include scholars, former federal judges, and those who support change within democratic institutions.

Bob Bauer, a New York University School of Law professor and a former White House Counsel, and Cristina Rodriguez, a Yale Law School professor, and former deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice, will co-chair the commission. 

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The 36 member commission will take part in public meetings to hear the views of other "experts" on a topic, then submit a report six months after its first meeting.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the group "will also be looking at the court's role in the constitutional system, the length of service and turnover of justices on the court, the membership and size of the court."

However, the "size of the court" is a hot-button political issue as many Republicans have accused liberals of wanting "court packing" by adding more liberal justices to the court so they can get the rulings they want.

The U.S. has had nine justices on the Supreme Court since 1869. To add additional justices would take an act of Congress, along with support from the President, but it's unclear how the country would respond to such a serious move to change 150+ years of precedent.

Last October, Biden told Americans that if he was elected president, he would create a bipartisan commission to study reforming the high court. 

"I will ask them to, over 180 days, come back to me with recommendations as to how to reform the court system because it's getting out of whack," Biden said at the time.  

In a series of tweets, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) said Biden is unleashing a court-packing plan that's designed by Democrats to attack the country's most consequential court.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called the commission "a direct assault on our nation's independent judiciary and another sign of the far left's influence over the Biden administration."

McConnell added that constitutional scholars and Supreme Court justices have repeatedly said nine is a good number for members of the court. Even left-leaning Justice Stephen Breyer warned against the idea of adding new members just last week. 

Back when he was a senator, Biden himself once called the idea of packing the court "boneheaded."

And a poll last October found that 58 percent oppose increasing the size of the court while only 31 percent support it.

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