Submitted, for your consideration, is the following sequence of events:
1) Supreme Court Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy, the supposed "swing" vote between the liberal and conservative wings of the Court, sided with the conservative majority on a trio of high-profile cases involving Donald Trump's travel ban against some Muslims,* the legal obligation of pregnancy crisis centers to provide information on abortion services, and requirements that public employees pay mandatory dues to unions that represent their interests, but in which they do not have formal membership.
2.) The aforesaid Justice Kennedy submitted to Trump his resignation from active service on the Court, in unusually smarmy language. ("My dear Mr. President"? Really?)
3) Within days for the aforementioned resignation, the New York Times reveals, in a profile of Republican efforts to induce Kennedy to resign ahead of midterm elections that might shift Senate control (and the power to confirm judicial appointees) to Democrats, that Kennedy's son may have, er, *ahem*, "helped" Trump's business interests with loans in nine figures or more.
All this news, in less than a week. You've got to say this much in Trump's favor: his business "acumen" certainly seems to have accelerated the rate at which corruption has spread.
And the reach of that corruption as well.
Kennedy, Ronald Reagan's third choice to replace Lewis Powell on the High Court (after Robert Bork and Douglas Ginsburg), has generally enjoyed a favorable reputation during his three-decade career as an Associate Justice. His reputation as the Court's "swing" vote has yielded some important victories for progressive interests, most notably the majority opinion in Ogberfell v. Hodges that established a constitutional right to marriage equality for gays and lesbians. And, apart from political ideology or judicial philosophy, his personal and professional reputation have been unblemished by scandal.
Until now. Now, we are left with the possibility that Kennedy, knowing that he and his family were about to be hit with some political dirt, courtesy of the Times, decided to be very un-swingy on three major decisions, and then, as an additional gift to his son's debtor, open up a vacancy on the Court that could be filled with whiplash speed by the Republicans ahead of the midterms. All locked into place before the (shall we say) dirt hit the proverbial fan.
And, given that this is Trump that we're talking about, exactly how unlikely is that possibility?
How difficult is it to imagine Trump, in exchange for a rather sizable loan that he may or may not be able to pay back (remember: Trump), promising to give Kennedy the most favorable possible treatment with regard to replacing him on the Court, including an exit that would help Kennedy to atone for some if the more liberal consequences, first by locking in some major conservative victories in important cases, and then exiting at a time that would theoretically put pressure on Democrats in red states to be intimidated (or, as they say, "bipartisan") with regard to their votes for Kennedy's replacement?
Not difficult at all, I'm afraid. As several people (myself included) have said on more than one occasion, Trump has a reverse Midas touch. He corrupts and destroys everything he touches. Even Supreme Court Justices, it seems.
*Exceptions to the ban, of course, exist for Muslims from nations in which Trump's real estate company has or will soon have development projects. This despite the fact that several of these nations have supplied terrorists who have attacked U.S. citizens, including, of course, those who were killed in the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. One should reflect carefully on this, in assessing how seriously Trump takes his responsibilities for keeping the nation safe, avoiding conflicts of interests, and otherwise avoiding Constitutional violations that could provide the basis for impeachment hearings (the Emoulments Clause of the Constitution comes to mind).
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