'Better be careful': WSJ editorial warns Trump's 'lousy taunts' primed to 'backfire'

President Donald Trump is "taunting" Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts — and he "better be careful," warned the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board, because it could "backfire."

The board wrote Friday evening about Trump's downplay of Roberts' stern rebuke earlier in the week.

On Tuesday, Roberts issued a rare public statement rebuking Trump, who hours earlier had demanded the impeachment of U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, who had ruled against the administration's deportation plans. In his statement, Roberts said, "For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose."

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Trump tried to deflect when asked about Roberts' stinging statement, noting that the chief justice didn't call him out by name.

But the board warned Trump "had better be careful."

"The White House strategy of bashing judges and jamming the Supreme Court could backfire in spectacular fashion," the Journal warned, adding that "guessing the thinking at the High Court is a fraught exercise" — but that one thing we know is Roberts "hates being dragged into political fights."

"He prizes the reputation of the Court as a neutral arbiter of the law and protector of the Constitution," the board noted. And while his statement was a "matter-of-fact summary of the law," the Journal's editors "bet he was none too pleased with being drawn into the fray."

The board said Trump didn't take the hint, though and later "taunted" the Supreme Court in a classic Truth Social rant over lower-court rulings, which he hopes will be "vindicated" by the Supreme Court.

This, the Journal said, is where Trump's strategy could backfire.

"Mr. Trump may find the more he speaks up the more the Court resists his demands," the board warned.

Additionally, Trump may get the opportunity to nominate successors to aging justices Clarence Thomas,76, and Samuel Alito, who will turn 75 next month.

"Neither one is likely to resign if he lacks confidence in Mr. Trump’s judgment about who might be his successor. They have too much respect for the law, and the Court, to resign if they think Mr. Trump will nominate a results-first, law-second legal hack," wrote the board.

The editorial concluded, "The irony of Mr. Trump’s judicial taunts is that he has a Supreme Court more favorable to his claimed constitutional views than any President in memory. Three of the Justices were his choices, and all were good ones. He’s more likely to get the results he wants if he trusts their judgment."