Schumer: Unseemly to confirm Gorsuch amid FBI probe of Trump campaign

[kpete]

“I’d like to point out that it is the height of irony that Republicans held this Supreme Court seat open for nearly a calendar year while President Obama was in office, but are now rushing to fill the seat for a president whose campaign is under investigation by the FBI,” Schumer said, according to remarks sent out by his office.

Schumer said that, to him, it seemed “unseemly to be moving forward so fast on confirming a Supreme Court Justice with a lifetime appointment” due to the looming FBI investigation, which could potentially last for months or years.

“You can bet that if the shoe was on the other foot—and a Democratic President was under investigation by the FBI—that Republicans would be howling at the moon about filling a Supreme Court seat in such circumstances,” Schumer said. “After all, they stopped a president who wasn’t under investigation from filling a seat with nearly a year left in his presidency.”


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2017/live-updates/trump-white-house/neil-gorsuch-confirmation-hearings-updates-and-analysis-on-the-supreme-court-nominee/schumer-unseemly-to-confirm-gorsuch-amid-fbi-probe-of-trump-campaign/?tid=ss_tw&utm_term=.9e121e158c00

[PhilosopherKing]

1. Promising

Hopefully the Dem Senators will filibuster.

[red dog 1]

12. Filibuster won't work

If Senate Dems try to filibuster, The Turtle will just invoke the "nuclear option"

[Fast Walker 52]

15. but can they do that midterm? I thought technically they had to wait for a new term

for changes to parliamentary rules. Of course, they could screw the rules, but just as a matter of Senate principle?

[red dog 1]

23. McTurtle can change the rules anytime he wants to.

Also, he's already stated that if Democrats attempt to filibuster Trump's SCOTUS choice, he WOULD invoke the nuclear option.

[NewRedDawn]

26. Let the fucker do it!

Then laser focus on the media how they refused to vote for a legitimate Presidents nominee, but want to ramrod a Right wing extremist through that was not their pick as well as by a Russian installed president.
Call the Confederate fascist scumbags bluff.

[FakeNoose]

2. No sh*t Sherlock!

Put this guy on hold.

Even if Gorsuch does deserve to be confirmed, he has to understand the tricky/shady circumstances of his nomination.
Any judge worth his salt would want to have the politics taken out of his confirmation hearing.
Put this on hold until the impeachment, trial and public execution of Trump is over with.

[Girard442]

4. Ironically, if Gorsuch were truly qualified...

...He would demand that his nomination be put on hold.

[Scruffy1]

27. I agree.

Given the circumstances and the way the judiciary branch was treated by the Republicans I don't think an honorable man would accept the nomination. Of course I don't think any homorable person would accept doodly from 45.

[L. Coyote]

3. Indeed, first determine the legitimacy of the election. Our election was swiftboated!

Is Trump the Swiftboat Admiral?

[KewlKat]

5. Since the Con may be in his "final" year in office, no nominee should be put forth.

[Lucky Luciano]

6. That was a great line!!! nt

[KewlKat]

8. Thank you........... :)

[appal_jack]

7. You're going to have to do better than "unseemly," Chuck.

Trump ordering his steak well-done & with ketchup is "unseemly."

A GOP Senate willfully turning its back on credible evidence of treason in the Executive Branch so that it might hurriedly confirm a tainted and Dominionist nominee to a lifetime appointment at the very top of the Judicial Branch, after the spot was left vacant for more than a year due to the basest partisanship is a coup.

Step it up, Chuck. Your choices are full filibuster and total destruction of the Gorsuch nomination via completely and effectively concerted Democratic action, or the final and complete irrelevance of the Democratic Party. The ball is in your court, Senator.

-app

[flamingdem]

9. Vile

is a better word

[red dog 1]

14. "full filibuster"?

Do you really believe McTurtle would allow that?

[appal_jack]

28. The whole point of a filibuster is that the Majority Leader on his owncannot stop it.

And if the Democrats stay united, McTurtle does not have the 60 votes to stop a filibuster.

-app

[WillowTree]

32. "Cannot stop it"............unless he pulls the nuclear lever.

[appal_jack]

33. Let him.

McTurtle 'goes nuclear' and then all three branches of the US government lose all legitimacy. A Putin-kompromat traitor President, a craven, complicit, and wholly base Legislative Branch, and a Supreme Court riddled with a zombie (Thomas), an unqualified fundamentalist automaton (Alito), and a corporatist and Dominionist usurper (Gorsuch). How long could such an illegitimate system persist before there is rioting and armed insurrection (which I DO NOT want)?

-app

[EffieBlack]

42. Let him do it

Let HIM be the one to force the appointment by going nuclear instead of the Democrats rolling over and giving him what he wants because they're afraid that if they don't he'll do it anyway. Maybe he will, maybe he won't. But let the blood be on HIS hands, not ours.

[red dog 1]

34. Senate rules can be changed by a simple majority vote

"McConnell: Use of nuclear option is 'up to Democrats'"
(CNN article from 2/5/2017)

WASHINGTON - Senate majority Leader Mitch McConnell left the door open to using the
"nuclear option" and eliminate the Senate's rule requiring 60 votes to confirm Supreme Court Justices if Democrats attempt a filibuster.
http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/05/politics/mitch-mcconnell-nuclear-option-supreme-court/

[ProfessorGAC]

46. I've Heard However, . . .

. . .that some R's don't want to do that, because the adults in the room know that no majority is forever. They don't want to paint themselves into a corner like that. So, they might not even have a simple majority.

[bluecollar2]

16. well put...

[leftstreet]

17. +1

[KittyWampus]

25. It's the perfect framing and DU'ers who decide to criticize a Democrat who is doing a good job

really make wonder.

[appal_jack]

39. Whether Schumer does a good job or not remains to be seen.

Who are these DU'ers "who decide to criticize a Democrat who is doing a good job," KittyWampus?

I myself am taking a wait-and-see approach to Schumer. Today, I saw good (actually, excellent) work from Klobuchar and Franken.

Now the job of a Senate leader is to amplify and expand the good work done by them, to hold the line of Democrats, to fight the nomination where he can actually make a difference (the cloture vote), and to frame the larger debate both in the Senate and in the media.

I would like to see Schumer do a good job. I really would. I think that a truly good job will require stronger words than "unseemly."

-app

[appal_jack]

47. Still not up to snuff, Chuck:

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/03/mitch-mcconnell-neil-gorsuch-confirmation-236319

“The bottom line is that I believe we need 60 votes,” Schumer said. “Any one member can ask for 60 votes, it’s going to happen.”

THAT'S what is supposed to pass for Democratic Leadership and principled opposition? Where is the framing that Gorsuch is an extreme wolf in smooth-operator-sheep clothing? Where are the demands that he actually answer some damned questions? Where is the steady drumbeat that any nominee of a President under criminal investigation be put on hold? For that last point to stick, Schumer has to repeat it ad nauseum. That's his fucking job as Minority Leader!

-app

Fail

[Tatiana]

40. And this is why we need new blood.

Even if their heart is in the right place, their tactics and the language are not up to the task. We are facing an unprecedented threat. We need a Ted Kennedy, a Lyndon B Johnson, a Rayburn... hell I'd even settle for a Tip O'Neill.

We have members in Congress such as Maxine Waters who want to fight. But sometimes this feels like that clip in Fahrenheit 9/11 where we see several Democratic members of the House object to the election results, but not a single Democratic Senator support the objection.

Our leadership needs to meet the challenge or step aside for those who will.

[uponit7771]

45. +1

[Mr. Sparkle]

10. every Democratic Senator should be saying this n/t

[JudyM]

22. We need to all call them all to say this. 202-224-3121

[Duppers]

29. Hear hear!

Got up ranting this morning about the same thing. I've been livid all day.

Call our dems, folks.

[pscot]

11. Illegitimate presidency

None of his appointees should have been confirmed

[JDC]

13. Unseemly could not be more of an understatement.

[pangaia]

18. I just emailed both Schumer and Gillibrand, MY other senator.

I tried to call but lines are too busy.....

Unfortunately Chris Collins is my unrep. He's a fucking asshole...

But we're going to fight like hell to dump him.. An uphill battle, for sure since the googledeepoop gerrymandering...

[red dog 1]

19. Gorsuch: "I'd like to convey to you that, at the bottom of my heart, I'm a fair judge."

This was his reply yesterday to a question asking for his personal opinion on Roe v Wade.
(He refused to "convey" his personal opinion)

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse: (To Gorsuch today)
"Your record on corporate versus human litigants comes in by one count at 21 to 2 for corporations....Tellingly, big special interests and their front groups are spending millions of dollars in a dark money campaign to push your nomination."
(Democracy Now, March 21, 2017)

Gorsuch is an ultra-right ideologue who doesn't deserve to be on the Supreme Court; but, unless 3 Senate Republicans join all 48 Senate Democrats to vote against him, he will be confirmed, and, unfortunately, there's nothing Schumer or anyone else can do about it.

[sharedvalues]

21. But they can make the GOP pay in the media

But the Democrats are not even doing that.

[Cosmocat]

24. Yep - he is a pretty charming guy

but the SC is too important to these assholes for them to put him up unless they KNEW he was going to be really reliable.

[NewRedDawn]

30. Sorry. Still need 60 votes.

Unless Comrade Moscow McConnell changes the rules. It will be a PR victory anyway if the traitorous Fucker does. Hang the stolen pick & stolen election around their fat bloated necks!

[Initech]

36. Gorsuch doesn't deserve to judge a beauty pageant!

[sharedvalues]

20. Go to the press, Schumer

Get 10 Democratic senators. Give them the same talking points on Gorsuch. Go on many different TV shows and have them say the same thing.

In other words use the effective media strategy that the GOP uses.



This is a stolen seat that a foreign backed president shouldn't get to fill.

[Valhallakey]

31. It would taint Gorsuch

Let the investigation complete otherwise it may taint Gorsuch the rest of his years on the Supreme Court. Seems like a logical argument to make to the Republicans.

[Initech]

35. Wait for the next president!

[red dog 1]

37. Despite every reason to stop Gorsuch, Are Dems letting him off the hook?

In one exchange during the second day of Gorsuch's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the committee, asked the appellate judge if he agreed with the dissent or the majority opinion in the District of Columbia v. Heller decision.

After it was clear Gorsuch would not give a clear answer on the case, which upheld an individual's right to possess firearms, Feinstein quickly relented: "Alright, I'll let you off the hook."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1016181538

[Alice11111]

38. Schumer? Wow, that is spine. Take them on!!

[Cha]

41. "Unseemly"? I'd with "Wrong!"..

[yortsed snacilbuper]

43. K&R

[Mc Mike]

44. Please stay strong and keep fighting for us, Senate Dems. rec, nt.