Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett shared a poignant family moment at a legal conference, recalling when her 13-year-old son found a bulletproof vest she had brought home, The Washington Post reported.
During a candid conversation at the 10th Circuit Bench & Bar Conference, Barrett said the moment occurred after she was sent home with the vest as part of her heightened security detail. Her son, surprised, asked if it was a bulletproof jacket. Barrett, unsure of how to respond, hesitated. She wondered if she should have hidden it from him. But her son's next reaction surprised her.
"He said, 'That's so cool! Can I try it on?'" she recounted to laughter from the audience. The lightheartedness, however, gave way to a more serious question from her son: "Why do you have a bulletproof vest?"
The event, where Barrett spoke alongside Chief Judge Jerome A. Holmes and Judge Allison H. Eid, was primarily focused on personal topics, steering away from the Supreme Court's contentious cases.
Barrett discussed the challenges of being a public figure while raising seven children, describing how her family has adjusted to her demanding role. Still, she acknowledged that traveling with a constant security detail from the U.S. Marshals has been particularly challenging.
During the 45-minute discussion, Barrett touched on her life outside the courtroom. She mentioned her collaboration with fellow Justice Sonia Sotomayor on a PBS show about civility and shared that she maintains her New Orleans heritage by cooking traditional dishes like gumbo and jambalaya at home.
Barrett briefly commented on the dynamic among the justices. When asked if their legal disagreements ever turned personal, she assured the audience that their debates remained professional. "On the court, justices are sparring over ideas, not one another," Barrett said. "It's not personal."
At 52, Barrett has emerged as a unique voice among the court's conservative majority. In her fourth term, which concluded in July, she occasionally challenged her fellow Republican appointees, calling for more moderate, pragmatic approaches to certain issues.
In one notable dissent, she criticized the conservative majority's reasoning in a case related to the Environmental Protection Agency's air pollution regulations, calling their arguments "feeble" and "cherry-picked."
Despite the occasional disagreement, Barrett remains a consistently conservative vote on major issues, often aligning with Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
As the Supreme Court prepares for its next term, Barrett and her colleagues face a range of significant cases, including those involving gender transition care for minors, ghost guns, and an innocence claim from an Oklahoma death row inmate.
The Supreme Court's next term is set to begin in early October.