Sonia Sotomayor Cites Ta-Nehisi Coates in a Supreme Court Dissent

John Reid

Race is everything for the “wise Latina.”  

The media have widely praised Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent in Utah v. Strieff. Even though she is derided as one of the worst writers on the bench, even by her ideological comrades, headlines describe the dissent as “stinging” (New York Daily News), “ringing” (Atlantic), “fierce” (Washington Post), “fiery” (CNN), “epic” (Nation), “blistering” (NPR), “biting” (Christian Science Monitor), and “scathing” (NBC).

In particular, they praise the dissent for bravely taking on racial injustice in America. Slate called it an “atomic bomb of a dissent slamming racial profiling and mass imprisonment.” Mother Jones lauded the “court’s only Latina justice” for putting “her life experience to practice” and “excoriating her colleagues for misunderstanding the police harassment to which people of color are regularly subjected.” The Atlantic wrote that “few institutions in American life have grappled with race and racism like the U.S. Supreme Court, for better or worse, but rarely does it speak about it with this level of detail.” It went on to suggest that the dissent may be a “veiled nod to the Black Lives Matter movement.”.........There’s just one problem. Utah v. Strieff has nothing to do with police brutality, racial profiling, mass incarceration, or any of the pet causes of Black Lives Matter or the even broader “criminal justice reform” movement.........Justice Sotomayor’s tangent is remarkable for its imprecise language (what does “double consciousness” mean?), lack of relevance to the case, false claims, radical sources, and citations that do not support her assertions........To Read More.....