Chief Justice John Roberts decides to keep Peter Navarro in jail

As most know, Peter Navarro just asked the Supreme Court to allow him to stay out of prison while his sentence is under appeal. Chief Justice Roberts denied the request:

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to halt a prison sentence for former Trump White House official Peter Navarro as he appeals his contempt of Congress conviction.

Navarro is due to report Tuesday to a federal prison for a four-month sentence, after being found guilty of misdemeanor charges for refusing to cooperate with a congressional investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Navarro had filed an emergency appeal to stay free while he appeals his conviction.

In Navarro’s words earlier this year, via Fox News:

‘When I received that congressional subpoena, the second, I had an honest belief that the privilege had been invoked, and I was torn. Nobody in my position should be put in conflict between the legislative branch and the executive branch. Is that the lesson of this entire proceeding? Get a letter and a lawyer? I think in a way it is,’ Navarro said at a January sentencing hearing. ‘I am disappointed with a process where a jury convicted me, and I was unable to provide a defense, one of the most important elements of our justice system.’

What does this suggest about the Roberts’ Supreme Court, most particularly Roberts himself, and the languishing Jan 6 defendants? It suggests this, at least:

1. There will be no compassion for issues of age and health, or just generally, such as that routinely doled out to “left” or “liberal” supplicants to our courts (e.g., see Georgia and Fani’s prosecution).

2. There will be no recognition of constitutional law, disregarded in Navarro’s “case”—such as the right to provide a defense.

3. There will be no recognition of executive privilege for presidential, or ex-presidential, advisor testimony as forced under subpoena.

Per Breitbart News, Justice Roberts “explained” his rapid rejection of the emergency request on behalf of Navarro was because he had “no basis to disagree” with the lower appeals court. And worth noting, via Politico, is this:

Departing from the practice in most serious or high-profile legal fights, Roberts ruled on Navarro’s request himself, without referring it to the full court.

The elderly, frail, and heroic Navarro may not survive a purely symbolic four-month prison sentence. He may well finally collapse from his multi-year, Trump-associated, persecution nightmare—which became overdrive when Navarro publicly questioned the Biden Swamp’s COVID directives.

If Navarro’s will to live fails at this long last, will Chief Justice Roberts still have “no basis to disagree” that the political/legal persecution, absent of any quality of mercy, of Peter Navarro was, indeed, “justice” served? 

The next time (if it happens) that the Chief Justice checks in on his “basis to disagree,” he might care to glance at a high requirement in our justice system is that of mercy—and also, he might take a gander at absence of influence.

Image: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from Washington D.C, United States, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons, unaltered.