Gorsuch Pitches Kids Book to Right, Insisting Court Nonpartisan

Three conservative Supreme Court justices, including Neil Gorsuch, insisted this week that they’re not political actors while defending an institution they claim is wrongly viewed through a partisan lens.

Where Gorsuch chose to talk about his new children’s book, however, shows how the court’s liberal-conservative divide can extend even to the justices’ publicity tours.

Gorsuch opted to speak mostly with conservative and libertarian outlets including Fox News, National Review, Reason, and Hugh Hewitt’s radio show, along with ABC News, CBS News and an interview with New York Times columnist David French. He also made an appearance on “The Megyn Kelly Show,” during a podcast title featuring, “Katie Porter MELTDOWN, and Obama’s Marriage Tension.”

Gorsuch’s planned stops also include the Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, and George W. Bush presidential libraries. And whereas liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson appeared on ABC’s “The View” to promote her memoir released in 2024, Gorsuch went on “Fox & Friends.”

“Gorsuch is following in the long tradition of Supreme Court Justices hawking books before likely sympathetic audiences,” said Rick Hasen, a law professor at the University of California Los Angeles who’s tracked the rise in justices’ public appearances.

“Heroes of 1776: The Story of the Declaration of Independence,” which was released May 5 ahead of the nation’s 250th birthday, is the third book Gorsuch has authored and first geared to a younger audience. He’s said he wrote the book with his ex-clerk Janie Nitze because of his concerns about the falling rate of civic education.

Gorsuch has at the same time used the tour to sound an optimistic note about the state of the country and a Supreme Court that’s seen declining approval ratings. When asked about political polarization, Gorsuch has retorted, “we’ve always been at that place.”

Days earlier, the court further limited the Voting Rights Act, which inspired heated dissents from the three liberals, triggered Republican efforts to redraw maps ahead of the midterm elections, and led to renewed liberal calls to overhaul the court.

Gorsuch, President Donald Trump’s first Supreme Court appointee, hasn’t commented on specific cases during his publicity tour. But he’s repeatedly said the notion of a divided court ignores the unanimity it reaches in about 40% of cases decided on the merits—a statistic he’s called “magical.”

‘Intended Audience’

Gorsuch and his publisher, HarperCollins, didn’t respond to requests for comment on his press tour and where he chooses to appear.

His schedule to date, however, adheres to a playbook that other justices have generally followed—a group that includes Jackson, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, who released her memoir in 2025, and Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who published her fifth children’s book last fall.

Collectively, they’ve earned millions of dollars in advances and royalties, sums far exceeding the $306,600 each earns as an associate justice and outside teaching income that’s capped at $30,000. Gorsuch has netted $1.4 million from his earlier books, according to disclosures.

The watchdog group Fix The Court in a report released last September found the justices’ book tours in 2024 and 2025 featured appearances that often reflected right-or-left partisan leanings.

The justices have discretion over their speaking activities, although a code of conduct the court adopted in 2023 said they should consider the possibility of creating “an appearance of impropriety in the minds of reasonable members of the public.”

For publishers, the goal is to drive sales and hit bestseller lists, which usually requires high-profile authors to do a certain number of media appearances and book signings, said Kathleen Schmidt, a former publishing strategist.

“The goal is to reach the intended audience,” Schmidt said. “So it makes sense that Justice Gorsuch would appear on conservative media. He is a conservative judge, so MS NOW or CNN would not make much sense.”

Such dynamics hurt the argument that the court isn’t partisan, said Gabe Roth, executive director of watchdog Fix the Court. “Having justices going on news outlets that are known for partisanship is not helpful,” Roth said.

Gorsuch’s interviews have largely focused on his book and the ideals of the founding generation. But his comments to mostly friendly outlets, in wake of the contentious voting rights ruling, comes across as “a bit tone deaf,” Hasen said.

The justices reaching unanimity in a case on the meaning of bankruptcy statutes or parts of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure “does nothing to militate against the fact that in the cases that matter the most, Republican-appointed Justices are on one side of controversial issues and Democratic-appointed Justices on the other,” he said.

Celebrity Figures

By writing a children’s book, Gorsuch follows in the footsteps of Sotomayor and Jackson, who released a young-adult adaptation of her memoir in January. The late Justice Sandra Day O’Connor also published one about her childhood pony.

The books’ success also showcases the celebrity status the justices now occupy in particular circles, said Neal Devins, a William & Mary University law professor and co-author of “The Company They Keep: How Partisan Divisions Came to the Supreme Court.”

“People who write children’s books are celebrities or children’s book authors,” Devins said. “It’s a good proxy, a good measure for how the job of a Supreme Court justice has changed.”

Gorsuch’s schedule includes upcoming appearances with C-SPAN and a visit to the nonpartisan National Constitution Center in Philadelphia.

Other conservative justices are using public appearances to similarly portray the court as a nonpartisan, steady institution.

Barrett at the Bush Presidential Center on May 4 said the narrative of a partisan breakdown is “just not true.” Chief Justice John Roberts added at a judicial conference in Pennsylvania that “we’re not simply part of the political process.”

It’s a message Gorsuch is bringing with him on what’s served as the first book tour by a justice this year. “I was a law clerk in 1993, and you’d think, ‘boy lots has changed,’” he told a crowd at the Reagan library. “That place hasn’t changed at all.”