Gavel Grab: Gorsuch Vote Delayed, Opposition Continues to Rise
DEMOCRATS DELAY VOTE ON GORSUCH BY ONE WEEK: Democrats in the Senate Judiciary Committee have requested that the vote to confirm Gorsuch be put aside until April 3rd, reported U.S. News & World Report. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has stated that the full senate vote will be on Friday, April 7th.
GROWING OPPOSITION TO GORSUCH: Senators Hirono, Nelson, Stabenow, Peters, Cardin, Reed, Van Hollen, Murphy, Shaheen, and Durbin have added their voices to the growing number of senators who will oppose Gorsuch, bringing the number of senators opposed so far to at least 25. Gorsuch’s “path to 60 votes is rapidly closing — setting the stage for a nuclear showdown in the Senate as soon as next week,” reported Politico.
Opposition to Gorsuch’s nomination is also growing in the public sphere. An editorial by The Aurora Sentinel called Gorsuch a “fatally flawed” candidate for the Supreme Court, expressing concern that “when it comes to weighing cases affecting what are arguably some of the most important and critical rights bestowed on American citizens, Gorsuch trades his usual legal pragmatism for religious philosophy.”
An op-ed in the Indy Star stated that Gorsuch’s “decisions evidence a person who serves his own views rather than legal mandates and is far out of touch with, and coldly unsympathetic to, the concerns of ordinary Americans. They portray a jurist who is so persuaded he is right, even when his colleagues disagree, that he heeds his own rigid ideology, avoiding the respectful consideration of different points of view that should characterize an appellate court. Judge Gorsuch pushes the law to reach results that serve his political and social views, and his manipulations contradict what Congress has directed and prejudice people whom Congress has tried to protect.”
While many of Gorsuch’s supporters have lauded his commitment to precedent, there has been a lack of understanding of the impact of precedent. Citing the story of Alphonse Maddin, Stephen Gottlieb stated in an opinion piece at The Hill that “language ordinarily incorporates principles of decency and humanity. Judge Neil Gorsuch repeatedly tried to sound sympathetic…But Judge Gorsuch concluded that the’ plain meaning’ of the statute did not protect Maddin from freezing to death.” He continued, “And there is the underlying difference between a judge like Gorsuch and those more liberal. Gorsuch makes decency jump over hurdles. More liberal judges, probably like Judge Merrick Garland, whom the Republicans would not even bring up for hearings, would make indecency and inhumanity bear the burden of proof. There is nothing in the language of the law that requires judges to be mean.”
