I hate to say it, but this is probably a losing battle. You can’t count on Collins and Murkowski to do the right thing and the three Dems mentioned will probably also cave. We have to play the long game by getting control of more state governments. I think that the long term impact of what is happening with SCOTUS will be the movement of educated individuals and businesses that need well-trained workers from red to blue states. The US will become two countries. We live in NC and are considering moving to a blue state if the state politics don’t turn around even though we love the area where we live and the cost of living is generally higher in blue states.
“Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. Both support a
woman’s right to have an abortion and will be looking for assurances
that the nominee would not overturn the Roe v Wade decision establishing
abortion rights.”
Thing is, there’s no story here if they are in fact not looking for those assurances. And Collins recently said she wouldn’t support someone who “demonstrably has hostility” toward Roe v. Wade. That’s a far cry from “looking for assurances they won’t overturn it.” This little semantic game points toward the Republican habit of “look at me!” followed by party-line vote. There really isn’t a “battle.”
The coming battle over a Supreme Court nominee promises to be a bruising one.
No it doesn’t. We didn’t have a bruising battle over Gorsuch, whose seat was a stolen one and absolutely ripe for a battle, and we won’t have a bruising battle here. The current argument being advanced by our electeds seems to be that the McConnell rule applies and there should be no confirmation ahead of the November midterms. That won’t inflict the slightest contusion on the Republicans. They have the votes, we have an argument that adds no value to the Democratic brand and inflicts no damage on the Republican cause.
We’ve already lost this Supreme Court seat. The best tack forward is to (1) insist that McConnell rule does not apply, because it’s a fraud on the constitution and on the Supreme Court; (2) this nomination is illegitimate, since by virtue of the Garland stolen seat it will confer an illegitimate and extremist Republican majority on the SC. On that footing–illegitimacy, not on the footing of Roe v Wade or any other policy concern–Jones, Heitkamp etc can vote against the nominee.
Also, Democrats should take this opportunity to put pressure on the one possible chink in the Republican hegemony–Roberts. If the Democratic narrative is that the “Trump-Roberts Court” no longer commands the trust of half the country, in particular after the shocking Kennedy revelations (which I see the Dems have, as per usual, shown zero spine about), then Roberts may well understand that a complete partisan domination of the court is not consistent with the institutional interests of which he’s the trustee, and may well think more carefully about his decision-making. “Trump-Roberts Court” should be the new name for the “Supreme Court” used by every Dem. This current mob have forfeiting the right to be called a “Supreme Court.”