Amy Coney Barrett: Reports of a constitutional crisis have been greatly exaggerated

NEW YORK — Is the country in a constitutional crisis? Not according to Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

“Look, I think the Constitution is alive and well,” Barrett said Thursday at an event to promote her new book, Listening to the Law. She cast aside concerns by legal scholars over the ongoing clash between the Trump administration and the courts.

“I don’t know what a constitutional crisis would look like,” Barrett, who was appointed by Trump in 2020, added. “I think that our country remains committed to the rule of law. I think we have functioning courts. I think a constitutional crisis — we would clearly be in one if the rule of law crumbles. But that is not the place where we are.”

Barrett’s remarks came during an interview at Lincoln Center with Bari Weiss, founder of the conservative digital media outlet The Free Press.

Weiss asked Barrett about the erosion of public trust in the Supreme Court, a development that Barrett said worries her.

“I would like Americans to trust the institution of the court,” she said, calling it “an institution that does operate with integrity.”

“I’m not saying that the court always gets it right. … I don’t think the court is above criticism or that I am above criticism or anything like that. But I do think Americans should trust that the court is trying to get it right.”

Those remarks echoed a sentiment expressed by Justice Brett Kavanaugh earlier in the day. Kavanaugh, speaking at a judicial conference in Tennessee, said the justices sometimes make mistakes because they are “human” but said they are “always trying to do better.” And he defended the court against criticism it has gotten over the terse, cryptic nature of many of its Trump-related rulings on its emergency docket.

Weiss also asked Barrett about recent criticism she has received from Trump supporters who have slammed her decision to side in several cases with the court’s liberal justices.

“To be in this job, you have to not care,” she said, referring to the criticism. “You have to have a thick skin.”

She added that she doesn’t have social media and that her husband and one of her assistants screen material for her and determine whether to share it with her on a “need-to-know arrangement.”