The Notorious RBG doesn't want to think about a President Trump

In an interview with the Associated Press, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg spoke about the just-concluded Supreme Court term, and the stakes of November's election for the court.

In an interview Thursday in her court office, the 83-year-old justice and leader of the court's liberal wing said she presumes Democrat Hillary Clinton will be the next president. Asked what if Republican Donald Trump won instead, she said, "I don't want to think about that possibility, but if it should be, then everything is up for grabs. . . ."

"It's likely that the next president, whoever she will be, will have a few appointments to make," Ginsburg said, smiling.

Justice Ginsburg also spoke about some of the high-profile cases from the court's last term.

She said court majorities this term moved to shut down tactics used by opponents of abortion and of affirmative action in higher education in two major cases.

Ginsburg said she doesn't expect to see any more such cases after the court upheld the use of race in college admissions in Texas and struck down Texas abortion-clinic regulations that the state said were needed to protect patients.

"It seemed to me it was a sham to pretend this was about a woman's health," rather than about making it harder to get an abortion, Ginsburg said. . . .

Ginsburg wrote a short separate opinion in the abortion case to complement [Justice Stephen G.] Breyer's majority opinion. "I fully subscribed to everything Breyer said, but it was long, and I wanted something pithy," she said. "I wrote to say, 'Don't try this anymore.' "

Justice Ginsburg also spoke about how the Supreme Court has changed since the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February. It's a "paler place," she said.

For those interested in the court, the whole interview is worth a read.

UPDATE: Rick Hasen notes that the story, as it first appeared, included some interesting comments about the Evenwel decision and the content of the Court's initial draft opinion.