Before you enjoy today’s nice weather, take a quick moment to check out some of the best SCOTUS-related moment from today’s Sunday Shows:
April 2, 2017
Sunday Show SCOTUS Summary
Before you enjoy today’s nice weather, take a quick moment to check out some of the best SCOTUS-related moment from today’s Sunday Shows:
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell On Dems Unprecedented Partisan Filibuster
MCCONNELL: I can tell you that Neil Gorsuch will be confirmed this week. How that happens really depends on our Democratic friends. How many of them are willing to oppose cloture on a partisan basis to kill a Supreme Court nominee – never happened before in history, in the whole history of the country. In fact, filibustering judges was started by your next guest, Senator Schumer, after George Bush 43 got elected president. We didn’t use to do this. Clarence Thomas was confirmed 52-48 the most controversial Supreme Court nominee in history and not a single Senator said he has to get 60 votes.
Majority Whip John Cornyn On Dems “Unprecedented, Partisan Filibuster” Of Gorsuch
DICKERSON: Switching to the Supreme Court nominee, Senator Schumer, the Democratic Leader, says he’s got the votes to filibuster Neil Gorsuch so will Republicans change the Senate rules?SEN. CORNYN: Well John, this is unprecedented in American history, a partisan filibuster of a Supreme Court nominee and unfortunately, this is the culmination of the escalation that began back when George W. Bush was president where Senator Schumer and others, liberal activists, came up with this strategy to try to block, through the filibuster, the confirmation of judges. It is theoretically possible, had been through our nation’s history, never happened before the George W. Bush Administration, and so Neil Gorsuch I think is the kind of nominee that our Democratic friends really haven’t been able to find any real fault with, except that he was nominated by this President and they realize that this is their last gasp to try to prevent him from being confirmed, but they won’t and Judge Gorsuch will be confirmed this week, one way or another. I hope the Democrats will provide the 60 votes and we don’t have to worry about the change of rules.
Washington Post’s David Ignatius: Gorsuch Easy To Imagine As A Justice, Dems Pandering To Base
IGNATIUS: I think one thing we’re watching is the Democrats feeling they need the play to their base. Neil Gorsuch is a likable person. He’s very conservative, but it’s easy to imagine as a justice. Democrats feel that the base is roused and they need this as payback time. You did this to Garland. So I think the Democrats could make a different choice, play to the middle, a whole different set of priorities, but that’s not what we’re seeing.
Former Justice Thomas Clerk, Laura Ingraham: We’ve Never Seen A Partisan SCOTUS Filibuster Like This
WALLACE: Laura is our resident Supreme Court watcher and a former Supreme Court clerk under Clarence Thomas. And I’m not taking sides here, I’m just really asking, because it just gets worse and worse and worse, is there any way out for these just ever more partisan wars, and what do you think, I’m not saying this is the fault of one side or the other about the fact that we’re it looks like this week we’re going to see a part of the institution of the Senate changed and turning more into the House where it doesn’t take a bipartisan majority of 60 – 51 votes, a simple majority – can decide any nomination.INGRAHAM: Well I think McConnell was right in his point. This is a 200-year Senate tradition that will be forever changed and Chuck Schumer, I mean I hate to say this during a Sunday, during Lent, but he’s absolutely fraudulent in the way he characterizes this. There has never been a partisan filibuster of a Supreme Court nominee. When my former boss was confirmed, during all of the controversy surrounding Clarence Thomas, there wasn’t a filibuster. He was confirmed and it wasn’t the largest of margins, but he was confirmed, the vote went forward, and he, you know, ended up sitting on the Supreme Court, much to the consternation of the left. But this is just, this is ridiculous at this point.WALLACE: But I mean nobody comes into this with plain hands. I mean Republicans were filibustering lower court judges in the Bush Administration — not the Bush Administration, the Clinton Administration. This has gone back and forth.INGRAHAM: But this, the Supreme Court nomination process has never gotten to this point where there is a threaten of a partisan filibuster. McConnell, I mean, McConnell, he knows the stuff inside and out, and he’s completely right the way he characterizes it. Now, I understand that the Democrats don’t want Neil Gorsuch to be on the Court, I get that. But he’s going to be on the Court. This, in the end, hurts Chuck Schumer, this hurts the Democrats, because if you get rid of, you know, this rule, the rule, now you will only be able to have 52 justices to confirm the next nominee.WALLACE: 51 Senators.INGRAHAM: 51 Senators. And it could be the next opening will come in June.