Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) offered an important reality check for Senate Republicans during Sunday night’s presidential debate: They’re keeping a Supreme Court seat open for a man many have suddenly decided is unfit for office.
Warren’s tweet came after Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were asked about the high court vacancy since Justice Antonin Scalia’s death in February. President Barack Obama nominated centrist federal appeals judge Merrick Garland to fill the post in March, but Republicans have refused to move the nomination forward.
“The next justice could fundamentally alter the direction of the Supreme Court and have a profound impact on our country, so of course the American people should have a say in the Court’s direction,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in March. “The Senate will appropriately revisit the matter when it considers the qualifications of the nominee the next President nominates, whoever that might be.”
Warren has fiercely criticized her GOP colleagues for their obstruction, accusing the party of caving to the extremism that also led to Trump’s rise.
“It’s not about a problem with a particular nominee,” she said in March. “What they were trying to do is effectively deny the legitimacy of this president, try to shut down the government, try to keep it from functioning.”
McConnell and his fellow Senate Republicans have remained steadfast in their decision to block Garland’s nomination, even when Trump became the GOP nominee.
Now, many of those same Republicans are withdrawing support for Trump over his lewd comments and boasts of sexual assault caught on a 2005 tape that was leaked Friday. Some have even called on him to drop out of the race.
McConnell, however, is still waiting until after the election to hold a vote on Garland’s nomination.
Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.
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