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In 2023, Alito sat for four hours of interviews for the Wall Street Journal, in a late July feature that dismissed the Alaska revelations as a “hit piece” and instead fluffed the justice as “the Supreme Court’s plain-spoken defender” and an “important justice” with a “distinctive interpretive method that is pragmatic yet rooted in originalism and textualism.”

For me, that was such a useful way to think about how factuality has been eroded by originalism, and textualism, and strict construction, or whatever the theory is, because it actually isn’t fact-based; it’s guess-based or maybe Ouija board–based or séance-based, just not based in any fact.

The society is widely seen as an instrumental force in cultivating young conservative lawyers and building a bench of future judges whose embrace of legal theories like originalism and textualism have led to decisions overturning abortion rights, environmental protections and social welfare policies.

Again, it’s in the plain language, and that’s textualism, right?

You know, there’s a difference between textualism and originalism.