One of the more underappreciated recent trends in American law and politics, obscured by a few high-profile conservative victories at the Supreme Court and thus noticed by few other than dyed-in-the-wool legal conservatives, is that former President Donald Trump’s three picks for the high court are soft and undependable.
The truth is that none of the Trump-era triumvirate of Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett can hold a candle to their two reliably conservative senior colleagues Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.
Kavanaugh and Barrett are pragmatic center-right judges, eager to avoid wading into hot-button “cultural” topics such as religious liberty and often disappointing when it comes to issues as wide-ranging as COVID-19 restrictions, immigration, and congressional redistricting.
Gorsuch has the strongest libertarian streak on the…
