Dems to Filibuster Gorsuch
Grasping for straws.
Despite Judge Neil Gorsuch’s stellar performance at this week’s confirmation hearings, anxious Democrat obstructionists are pulling out all the stops in a futile effort to spoil his confirmation. Part of the reason revolves around bitterness over Merrick Garland (Barack Obama’s flunked nominee). But the biggest reason has to do with Gorsuch’s originalist jurisprudence, which is antithetical to the ideology espoused by “living constitutionalists” on the Left.
No one has worked harder to politicize the hearings than Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, a career judicial saboteur whom the Washington Examiner correctly opines is “the best reminder that we need more judges like Gorsuch.” Schumer announced that he will lead a filibuster of Gorsuch, because he “was unable to sufficiently convince me that he’d be an independent check” on Donald Trump. That’s after Schumer floated the idea of ensnaring Gorsuch in the Left’s “Russia hacked the election” narrative. According to Schumer, “It is unseemly to be moving forward so fast on confirming a Supreme Court justice with a lifetime appointment while this big gray cloud of an FBI investigation hangs over the presidency.”
Sen. Elizabeth Warren is echoing this ploy: “Neil Gorsuch is up for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court from a President whose campaign is under FBI investigation.” Yet you have to wonder who’s really calling the shots. Democrat leaders are taking orders — or at least taking cues — from radical organizations like NARAL Pro-Choice America, whose president, Ilyse Hogue, is urging that lawmakers “delay hearings on Neil Gorsuch’s nomination while the president is under an active FBI investigation. Short of that, Senate Democrats must filibuster this nomination.” The organization previously joined 54 others in cosigning a March 14 Senate letter that states, “We implore senators to do everything necessary to block this nomination.”
Memo to Republicans: Don’t fall for it. Don’t even think about delaying the confirmation vote. Democrats will play politics with whomever is nominated. Don’t let abortion advocates dictate who will replace Justice Antonin Scalia. This week, Sen. Dianne Feinstein lectured Gorsuch by absurdly asserting Roe v. Wade established a “super precedent.” The only super precedent is the Constitution. And as for Russia, Democrats are using that narrative to delegitimize Donald Trump. Meanwhile, perhaps most of those who voted for Trump did so because of the Supreme Court. So don’t miss the irony of the two things converging here.
(Updated.)