I wonder if Justice Roberts doesn't want to reward the GOP's behavior?

He is terrible at playing the refs. He has alienated the chief justice.

With phone calls suggesting he rules in his favor, with bribes, threats, or suggesting he would be demonized if he refuses, and we're seeing Roberts reactions to trumps attempts to undermine justice and the rule of law and using them to protect him. If they rule his taxes must be turned over, then they find out they were doctored trump will be done. Many of his crimes then can be exposed , payoffs, payments made to him , and add Cohen and others information will be an ending to trumps crime spree. Surely there is records of phone calls to Roberts, and if trump used pressure with him , he should have recused himself , and if he still didn't he could be removed . trump has corrupted judges for years to escape justice, and I doubt he's stopped now.

He has a lifetime appointment. He doesn't have to fear Trump's base the way red state Congressmen do.

By all accounts, Roberts detests Trump. Remember, when Trump started going after various judges on immigration, Roberts got a bee in his bonnet and started speaking out about it in ways that were unprecedented for a Chief Justice. Usually they steer clear of political comments, but Roberts was just plain pissed.

He is hyperconscious of his legacy, and the very last thing he wants is to have the Court associated with Trumpism. And if he can stick his thumb in Trump's eye now and then, so much the better.

Now that it's clear Trump's electoral influence is waning (see his primary picks losing), it will be interesting to see who in the GOP starts breaking from him between now and November.

And does not always side with the liberal justices of course. He did, however, pass obamacare. His lifetime appointment is a sore subject with me. The solution to reverse the court-packing of Mcconnell's lifetime appointments is for Bidem's admin to impose term limits. 4 years & either you get reappointed or you're out fpr the lower positions. Maybe 6 years for SCOTUS justices. We can't have a SCOTUS that will remain red for several generations. That is highly dangerous.

Good for him.

views on abortion access. It was about his views on precedent and the mechanics of the court. Essentially, they HAD to rule as they did because this case asked exactly the same question as the Texas case from 4 years ago with Kennedy on the court. Roberts used this to save the GOP from itself in an election year. He'll vote against abortion, someday, he's just asking for a better case with which to do it.

He is most certainly not pro-choice. He voted that way because he had to protect the integrity of the Court regarding precedence.
I’m overjoyed that LGBT rights were protected. Maybe someday, maybe in my little granddaughter’s lifetime, women will get the same respect.

But they (men) won't let go.

Overturning a precedent established 4 years ago would look overtly political. The other conservative justices aren't bothered by this. Probably because it is how they make their summer money.

He is avoiding issuing controversial decisions during a presidential election year. And he is also sending a message to conservatives to put better cases before the Supreme Court if they want to push the country rightward. As conservative activists have stacked the federal courts in recent decades, they’ve come to expect judges and justices who will robotically approve their arguments, no matter how sloppy or repetitive they are. Roberts is signaling that he won’t tolerate that.

from opinion piece on Huffington Post and 100% correct

Like many norms and traditions we've depended on Presidents following, which Trump as flouted at every turn, a nine-member SCOTUS is not mandated by the Constitution.

Both as a way to compensate for Trump and McConnell's packing of the courts with ultra-conservative (and often ultra-corrupt and ultra-unqualified) judges, and for screwing Obama out of Merrick Garland's seat, I fully support Biden adding two more Justices and making the SCOTUS an eleven-member court.

Roberts might be trying to signal "Oh, no! Such a move is totally unnecessary! Nine is good, see?"

Thank you.

2020 gonna 2020 lol.