Will Replacing RBG Become The Top Issue In The 2020 Elections?

 

Currently there are 53 Republicans in the Senate and all they need to confirmed a replacement for RBG is a simple majority-- 50 (+ Pence to break a tie). 4 consistently unreliable Republicans have said they would not vote to confirmed a new justice this close to the election: Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Susan Collins (R-ME), Senate Judiciary Chair Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA). And then there's Mitt Romney, who's become the conscience of the Senate GOP-- the anti-McConnell, so to speak.

Trump says he will nominate someone immediately. Arch hypocrite-- and deceitful closet queen who lies as an everyday reflex-- Mitch McConnell has already said that Senate Republicans will vote on a nominee despite all he said-- and didn't do-- after Scalia's death. The Republicans can either try to confirm a nominee before the election or in the lame duck session after the election assuming Trump loses (and they lose the Senate majority, both of which are likely). At the very least, a Supreme Court fight will be a mega-MAGA-mobilization exercise for the GOP.

Jonathan Chait pointed out in an interview yesterday that "It’s not in the interest of Republicans facing election in 2020 to resolve this. Vulnerable Republicans are much better off having the court seat hinge on the outcome of the election. Trump himself might also be better off this way, though I doubt he will be cunning enough to see this. (Social conservatives will push him to fill the seat and he will go along, picking the course of maximal partisan aggression, as he always does.) Roberts himself also stands to lose power. He would no longer be the decisive vote. His only power would be to say something against filling the seat, and I doubt he says anything like that, but it is conceivable... [T]he lame duck period is another possibility. The dynamic is different. Any defeated Republican senators would have an incentive to vote for the nominee. However, that might seem like a more severe norm violation that could conceivably spark opposition..."

When Obama tried, unsuccessfully, replacing Scalia, he bolstered his case by nominating a very conservative, Republican-friendly Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Merrick Garland. Progressive support for Garland was grudging. That's how Democrats play. Trump will do the opposite-- find someone as polarizing as possible. These six neo-fascists are all on his short list. First and foremost is Amy Coney Barrett, an anti-choice sociopath. The other 5 include 3 senators (traditionally easiest to confirm among their colleagues): Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley and Tom Cotton-- although each has presidential ambitions. Two others on Trump's short list are two former solicitor generals-- Noel Francisco and Paul Clement. Others Trump is said to say considering include Britt Grant, Barbara Lagoa, Joan Larsen, Allison Eid, Amul Thapar and Senator Mike Lee (R-UT).

In a letter this morning, Bernie reminded his supporters of what Republicans have said on the topic, when they were tanking the Merrick Garland:

Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC)

"I want you to use my words against me. If there’s a Republican president in 2016 and a vacancy occurs in the last year of the first term, you can say Lindsey Graham said let’s let the next president, whoever it might be, make that nomination."

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX)

"It has been 80 years since a Supreme Court vacancy was nominated and confirmed in an election year. There is a long tradition that you don't do this in an election year."

Senator Cory Gardner (R-CO)

"I think we’re too close to the election. The president who is elected in November should be the one who makes this decision."

Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL)

"I don’t think we should be moving on a nominee in the last year of this president’s term--  I would say that if it was a Republican president."

Senator Rob Portman (R-OH)

"It is common practice for the Senate to stop acting on lifetime appointments during the last year of a presidential term, and it’s been nearly 80 years since any president was permitted to immediately fill a vacancy that arose in a presidential election year."

Please Stop And Let Me Finish, Sir by Nancy Ohanian

If Trump pushes through one of his extremists and McConnell confirms them in a lame duck session after Trump has lost the White House and the Senate, the appropriate response for the Democrats-- one that runs against their cowardly instincts-- would be to increase the size of the Court to 11 and confirm two liberal justices. But... Biden? NEVER!

Yesterday, Ben Jacobs, writing for New York, warned of a constitutional crisis in the making, even before Trump tries stealing the election. Jacobs predicted that "The appointment of a Supreme Court justice under these circumstances would transform ending the filibuster and expanding the size of the Supreme Court from a niche issue on the left to a fundamental litmus test... [I]f Joe Biden is elected and Democrats take control of the Senate, there could be a constitutional clash of a magnitude not seen since the New Deal when a right-wing Supreme Court took on Franklin Delano Roosevelt before eventually buckling under the threat of courtpacking."