Jodi Kantor

Like there's something irregular about this.

And the chief justice is saying essentially, I know, I know, I know, but it doesn't matter because this regulation is so expensive for states and the coal industry that we have to do something.

Yes, and what's also revealing about this memo is that he mentions the EPA again.

This memo makes it clear that he is truly in a power struggle with the Obama administration.

He feels this agency has tried to sideline the court, and he does not want it to happen again.

You know, in public, we're used to seeing the chief justice strike a very even-handed, magisterial tone.

Here, he's acting as a bulldozer.

He's saying to his colleagues, we should do something we have never done before, and we should do it fast.

And then Justice Elena Kagan, also a Democratic appointee, sounds an alarm.

She files a memo opposing the chief's stance that is even more direct.

She says,

She uses the word unprecedented to describe what the chief wants to do.

And she also says, we need more time on this case.

This is complicated.

She writes, on the merits, this is a difficult case involving a complex statutory and regulatory regime.

So in other words, she's saying, this is weird.

Are we sure we want to do this?

So you can see there that Justice Alito is echoing the chief justice's sense of insult.

The chief justice feels played by the Obama administration, the EPA.

And Justice Alito is saying, look, the Obama administration is trying to sideline us, to render us irrelevant.