DM Monitoring
WASHINGTON: U.S. President Donald Trump announced the third Supreme Court pick during his presidency on Saturday, kicking off a bitter confirmation battle on Capitol Hill just weeks before the November election.
Speaking from the White House Rose Garden, Trump said he’s nominating Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative federal appellate judge, to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a leading liberal voice on the Supreme Court.
“She is a woman of unparalleled achievement, towering intellect, sterling credentials, and unyielding loyalty to the Constitution,” Trump said of Barrett. “This should be a straightforward and prompt confirmation.”
Barrett, who sits on the bench of Chicago-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit, paid tribute to Ginsburg before acknowledging the challenges she might face ahead.
“Should I be confirmed, I will be mindful of who came before me,” the judge said. “Justice Ginsburg began her career at a time when women were not welcome in the legal profession. But she not only broke glass ceilings, she smashed them.”
“I have no illusions that the road ahead of me will be easy, either for the short term or the long haul…I assure you that I will meet the challenge with both humility and courage,” she said.
EDGING TOWARDS THE RIGHT
Trump successfully appointed two conservatives on the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch in 2017 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018, tilting the institution to the right with a 5-4 majority. Barrett, if confirmed by the Senate, would give the conservative wing a solid 6-3 advantage at the high court.
At age 48, she would also be the youngest member of the nine-justice bench and likely serve for the decades to come.
With 53 seats in the 100-member Senate, Republicans appear to have enough votes to approve Trump’s third Supreme Court pick and intend to hold a confirmation vote before the November election with an eye to energizing the conservative base. Only two Republican senators showed opposition to taking up a nominee prior to Election Day.
After the nomination ceremony for Barrett, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows told reporters that he believes Senate Republicans are going to “try to move through the process and review her credentials in an expeditious manner.”
“If they do that, based on the resume that I’ve seen, hopefully she would get confirmed before the first of November,” Meadows said.
NOMINATION GREETED BY PUSHBACK
Democrats oppose moving forward with a vote on Ginsburg’s replacement so close to the election, citing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s 2016 decision to block then-U.S.
