What on earth is DHS? Department of Health and Human Services? Gekko, if we're gonna read your posts, at least abide by the standard rule of using only well-known and standard acronyms that should be known to the reader instead of ones known only to the writer. It's not like vocabulary where someone has the choice to look it up. It's jargon without much context.
https://www.dhs.gov/
DHS is Department of Homeland Security. (It's the first thing that comes up when one puts DHS into Google)
US Marshals SOG is their tactical Special Operations Group. While they are not primarily tasked with close protection, the reality is that an actual threat to a sitting Supreme Court Justice would very likely be a well coordinated well funded pre planned strike from a comparable Tier 1 level tactical unit.
A member of Jon Ossoff's staff let it leak that Biden plans to pack SCOTUS when the dust settles. Many believe that as a precursor to the DNC shoveling as many new Justices as possible, esp with a Super Majority, that Republicans will try to reverse Roe Vs Wade first. The spearhead of this, if it happened, would be through Clarence Thomas.
Since the only way to change the numbers on SCOTUS is through retirement ( rare) and death ( unpredictable), this hyper accelerates the threat risk to Thomas. Extreme Pro Choice radical leftists will want to cancel out the conservative vote on SCOTUS. The easiest way to change the Court, in the eyes of extremists, is to start picking them off.
Colloton, Pityuk and Ho are all seen as GOP SCOTUS contenders, at varying levels, but have Pro Life leanings in their background. To nominate and confirm any of them would only further enrage extremists and lend the narrative that Roe Vs Wade is going to shift. Pacold worked for Thomas and that would literally start a war in the streets if she somehow turned longshot status into SCOTUS.
US Marshals has to coordinate with Secret Service ( via DHS) and Diplomatic Security Service as well as Federal Protective Service and Capitol Police to coordinate security for sitting Justices. DHS doesn't want this kind of conflict on their watch. If you pick off Thomas, the response by the extreme radical right will be to pick off liberal Justices in response.
Do I think Roe Vs Wade would get overturned? No. Abortion, while no one wants to say it out loud, is a functional resource management problem once you get past the anger, statistics and religion aspect of it. With the purchasing power of Third Wave Feminism, which leads to corporate level influence, there's no way things will change. Also who is going to pay for generations of unwanted children to raise them? But this isn't going to sway extremists.
This is the political backdrop under which Ted Cruz has to consider his chances at SCOTUS himself. It's not enough to trade his influence with the RNC delegates to Nikki Haley for a lock onto a nomination, he has to weigh out his actual competition for it to be sensible for Haley to agree ( i.e. is there a win/win pathway for both Haley and Cruz)
For long term legacy for Cruz, he has to topple the ACA. How does he do it from SCOTUS? He engineers Operation Fast & Furious gets the public spotlight and have it's case make it's way up to the Supreme Court. We are talking Obama and Holder gun running for drug cartels where the death of federal law enforcement covers blood on their hands. OF&F also links to Operation Wide Receiver during the Bush administration, which leads to wiping out Bush, Obama, Biden, Holder and since the ACA will topple with Obama's fall, it would also wipe out Pete Buttigieg and his patch over , Medicare For All Who Want It (A polite way for a Public Option without Obama having to swallow his pride to say that out loud)
As long as Obama loyalists hold power and sway, the ACA will survive.
It's not enough for Ted Cruz to get onto SCOTUS, he has to have a chance at historical legacy. Which is why Obama wanted the ACA to happen so badly, so he could pin his name to something he thought would last forever with his signature stamped all over it.
Ted Cruz is not just going to give Nikki Haley control over his delegates out of sheer goodwill. He's going to want something for them.
The idea that the RNC ticket in 2024 will be as simple as the leftist wet dream of hillbillies and white trash and Morlocks setting down their burning crosses long enough to hold delegates hostage for Donald Trump is really minimizing the high level of complexity in how delegate votes are essentially bought and sold with influence and political pork. But people don't want to talk about James Ho's chances at SCOTUS and how that dovetails into Cruz, then SCOTUS, then Haley, then Trump. They want to shout out the next Twitter bite sized nugget that the MSM demands they be outraged about.
Can you imagine how popular I would be with the majority here if I posted the exact same way, but as a woke cancel culture lefty that rode Orange Man Bad like it was sandpaper on a wooden deck?
But, alas, nothing is going to piss people off more than to hear about the SALT Act being repealed, risk limiting audits and the media optics on Young Kim in HOR CA-39. God forbid people actually talk politics in a subforum designated for political discussion.
BMST