General Discussion

President Donald Trump reportedly demanded that his seat be moved at the Supreme Court so he could sit directly in front of the court's justices during his unprecedented visit to the court to witness the oral arguments in his birthright citizenship case this week.

Trump became the first president to attend a Supreme Court oral argument, a move that many critics took to be a naked attempt to intimidate the court into ruling in his favor. Early in his second term, Trump issued an executive order challenging the 14th Amendment, which establishes that anyone born on U.S. soil is a U.S. citizen.

ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero told MSNOW that Trump was initially seated at the end of the first row of seats, but Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told the court's security that the president wanted to be moved to the center, where he would face the justices.

“Then it was clear that he was endeavoring to put his thumb on the scale,” Romero said. "“He was endeavoring to glower at the justices to kind of intimidate them, almost defy them to rule against him.”

Romero said that rather than appearing intimidating, Trump spent the hearing fidgeting in his chair. He said after ACLU Legal Director Cecilia Wang began making her opening arguments that the president "started getting restless" and that his "shoulders slumped a little bit."