In early 2016, also a presidential election year, the Senate refused to have a vote on SCOTUS nominee Judge Merrick Garland during similar but not identical circumstances. He was nominated by President Barack Obama, a Democrat, and the Senate was majority Republican. Presently, both the White House and Senate are GOP-led. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell claims that a White House and Senate of the same party offer no disagreement to halt such a vote now as they did four years ago.
But it is also rational for Americans on the right to see Coney Barrett’s nomination as fair and logical because only a fool would believe that a President Hillary Clinton and Senator Chuck Schumer would have delayed a vote on a Clinton nominee in such an alternate universe where the Democrats led both the White House and Senate.
In the immediate aftermath of the recent death of U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the refrain from those in the media and on the left was that her supposed dying wish, for her replacement to not be a Trump nominee, be honored. Understandable as it might be, it is a wish with zero Constitutional basis and RBG would have readily agreed.
And let’s be honest; if Trump and the Senate honored RBG’s wish, they would both have been thrown out of office for that decision alone by their own supporters, and everybody knows it, as Trump often says.
But Ginsburg exclusively had the opportunity to sidestep the entire issue, as Democrats for years encouraged her to retire so that she would be replaced by an Obama nominee. The thing is, RBG was no quitter, yet brilliant as she was, she did not foresee a Trump presidency. Her say on the subject was indeed made when she understandably decided to remain on the court, logically figuring her replacement would be nominated by Clinton. The weight of Ginsburg’s decision became monumental this month with her passing. She cannot be blamed for this choice whatsoever, though it is sad to think that her dying wish was more about that decision rather than of her family and amazing life.
Fatefully, Democrat voters had their say on July 26, 2016, when they nominated Clinton as their candidate and all of America had the final word on November 8 of that year when Trump was elected.
When Trump became president, it came with the right – and obligation – to make judicial appointments through the end of his term, which still has months remaining.
That is how the calendar, history and the stars worked it out.
With the anticipated Senate confirmation of Coney Barrett, Trump becomes the first president since Ronald Reagan to appoint more than two SCOTUS Justices. If he wins a second term, it is conceivable that Trump will get the chance to nominate more of them than any president except George Washington (11) and Franklin Delano Roosevelt (9), given the unusual circumstances of their presidencies. William Howard Taft nominated five, though it is officially considered six because one involved elevating a sitting Associate Justice to Chief Justice. (Taft was also the only chief executive in history to also serve on the Supreme Court, notably as its Chief Justice.)
Justice Stephen Breyer, the oldest current member of the Supreme Court, just turned 82.
Locally, Catholic-baiting California Governor Gavin Newsom further burnished his qualifications as a buffoon with this Tweet on the weekend’s subsequent social media entanglements. But when did he ever express such revulsion on things like the state’s worst-in-the-nation homelessness? To borrow his smug, antagonistic quote on an unrelated issue from years ago, the ascension of ACB to the Supreme Court “is gonna happen, whether ya like it or not!”
This is as good a time as ever to quote Obama who, a year after his re-election, said (famously or infamously, depending on where you stand), “You don’t like a particular policy or a particular president? Then argue for your position. Go out there and win an election. Push to change it. But don’t break it. Don’t break what our predecessors spent over two centuries building. That’s not being faithful to what this country’s about.”
In 2016, that is what the Republicans did.
In 2018, that is what the Democrats did in the mid-terms.
Election Day 2020 is barely more than a month away and it is still anyone’s guess.
(Daniel Guss, MBA, was runner-up for the 2020 Los Angeles Press Club journalism award for Best Online Political Commentary and has contributed to CityWatch, KFI AM-640, iHeartMedia, 790-KABC, Cumulus Media, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Daily News, Los Angeles Magazine, Movieline Magazine, Emmy Magazine, Los Angeles Business Journal, Pasadena Star News, Los Angeles Downtown News, and the Los Angeles Times in its Sports, Opinion and Entertainment sections and Sunday Magazine, among other publishers. Follow him on Twitter @TheGussReport. His opinions are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Photo: Saul Loeb-Pool/Getty Images. Prepped for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.
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