Democrats are warning Republicans not to fill a possible Supreme Court vacancy this year after denying President Barack Obama the chance in 2016, saying it would embolden a push on the left to add seats to the court whenever they regain power.
"We knew basically they were lying in 2016, when they said, 'Oh, we can't do this because it's an election year.' We knew they didn't want to do it because it was President Obama," Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said in an interview.
Kaine, the party's last vice presidential nominee and a lawmaker with a reputation as an institutionalist, said confirming a nominee of President Donald Trump this year could compel Democrats to consider adding seats to the high court.
"If they show that they're unwilling to respect precedent, rules and history, then they can't feign surprise when others talk about using a statutory option that we have that's fully constitutional in our availability," he said. "I don't want to do that. But if they act in such a way, they may push it to an inevitability. So they need to be careful about that."
In a sweeping statement of intent, the Democratic National Committee is poised to add language to the party's 2020 platform endorsing "structural court reforms to increase transparency and accountability."
The draft language, reviewed by NBC News and expected to be approved later this month, denounces Republicans as having "packed our federal courts with unqualified, partisan judges who consistently rule for corporations, the wealthy, and Republican interests" and for "blocking a Democratic president from appointing a justice to the Supreme Court."
Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/democrats-warn-gop-don-t-fill-supreme-court-vacancy-2020-n1234885
Replies
I say fill the court, but be careful you don't appoint another liberal like Roberts turned out to be
The Dem's will do whatever they like if they regain power... their threats should be ignored and the GOP should do what is best for the Nation and that which is Constitutional...
Let us not forget how obama and his corrupt group of azz clownz have black mailed chief justice john roberts to approve obamacare, unleashing the sexually confused and sexually derranged on America, and preying on our children with transexuals being brought into the class rooms to read stories to our children while exposing themslves to our children, if this is what you want then you are just as derranged as they are, it IS happening. Also, roberts ruled against President Trump from using a legal executive order to end daca, that was ILLEGALLY put in place by a obama executive order.
Wow, gee, as long as we had leftist marxist judges ruling against America on obamacare which was illegal, daca which was illegal, unleashing the sexually depraved and perverted on America, by redefining God's definition of marriage ( john roberts will burn in hell for that ungodly decision ), along with other America destroying decisions that benefited only the leftists in power. The left stacked the courts, now keeping darth vadre ginsberg on life support until they rig the 2020 election, stacked America's great institution that perverted our American way of life. And for the biggest success of the left, they drove GOD out of America, and the country has been in a downhell spiral ever since. God has noticed, He has given America time to repent or pay the consequences of His wrath, time for individuals to repent, God is knocking, you really should let Him in. GOD is watching, He is listening.
Trump 2Q2Q, Making America Americans' Again!
If America is so unfair to the minority races, then for the life of me, I can't figure out why they want to come here, unless it's for a free ride, and why they would vote for the leftists that actually destroyed their country's economies with the help of george belial soros.
I knew that already.
Who the h&&& cares what the Dems want.
Kaine's warning is a good example of a point made by Abraham Lincoln: " A robber sticks a gun in your face and says, 'Stand and deliver, or I shall kill you and then you will be guilty of murder.' "