Judges

Judges operate as the institutional interpreters of the Constitution, bound by procedural norms and interpretive doctrines that constrain political actors. In the episode they function as an invoked authority—portrayed by a nominee as committed to textualist limits—whose rulings convert abstract constitutional language into concrete legal outcomes. Their presence shapes confirmation strategy and executive rhetoric by supplying a stable, depersonalized framework of legal obligation that forces political actors to account for the judiciary’s role in resolving contested rights and remedies.