The Supreme Court nomination is in. The drama now moves to the Senate, where members like Marco Rubio can abide by the principles they once preached.
Florida’s senior senator could stand up in the Senate chamber and proclaim, “I said in 2016 that we should not consider a nomination made in the last year of a president’s term. Therefore, I will vote no on this nominee.”
Rubio could say that, but he won’t. He — and others like him — will pretend the doctrine he applied when President Obama nominated Merrick Garland does not apply to President Trump.
Rubio and his fellow Republicans won’t be the only members who will check their principles at the door of the Senate chamber.
“The Constitution is 100 percent clear. The President of the United States has the right to nominate someone to be a justice of the Supreme Court. The Senate’s function is to hold hearings and to vote.”
So declared Bernie Sanders in 2016, echoing just about every Democratic senator. Now they are saying that view of the Constitution is 100% clearly wrong and voting on Trump’s nominee would “defile the Senate.“
Welcome to the Supreme Court Circus, 2020 Edition. Plutonium-grade hypocrisy is nothing new on Capitol Hill, but a vacancy on the nation’s highest court brings out the worst in American politics.
The standard practice used to be if a nominee passed an FBI background check and had the required intellect, Senate approval was a given. That dignified exercise in democracy has descended into self-defiling tribal warfare.
Recall the cringe-inducing Judiciary Committee hearings for Brett Kavanaugh two years ago. The nadir came when Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse grilled Kavanaugh over passages in a 30-year-old high school yearbook and what he meant by the word “boof.”
When it comes to opinion polls, the legislative branch cannot sink much lower. The danger is that nominating spectacles will drag down the one branch of government the public still respects.
If you think it can’t get any worse than 2018, you haven’t been paying attention. Ruth Bader Ginsburg had been dead about 15 seconds before partisans manned their battle stations.
“We have a responsibility,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos. “We’ve taken an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
“President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell intoned in a statement, the same McConnell who denied Garland a hearing.
Both sides say if they don’t get their way, the Supreme Court will be illegitimate and democracy is doomed.
That’s not what a fragile country needs to hear right now. And for all the talk about double-standards and honoring Ginsburg’s last wish that whoever wins the Nov. 3 election choose her successor, only three rules apply here:
Presidents have the power to nominate a person to fill a Supreme Court seat at any point in their administrations. The Senate can approve that nomination until the congressional term expires. And people like Rubio and Lindsey Graham should keep their word.
Ginsburg’s death hasn’t triggered a constitutional crisis. It has triggered a political crisis. That means our elected representatives are going to act more like comedians than statesmen.
“Those are my principles,” Groucho Marx said, “and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.”
Groucho, Chico and Harpo — meet Marco. Based on recent performances, it’s obvious Rubio should be named an honorary brother.
No, he’s not the only hypocrite in this drama. But by gosh, he’s our hypocrite. And his body of hypocrisy work goes beyond a Supreme Court flip-flop.
When Rubio ran for president in 2016, he swore he was done with the Senate. After his campaign imploded, Rubio decided the Senate wasn’t such a bad place after all.
He was part of the “Gang of Eight” senators who produced a major immigration-reform bill in 2013. The Republican base revolted, so Rubio backtracked and started campaigning against a bill he coauthored and voted for.
No wonder Trump nicknamed him “Little Marco” during the 2016 campaign. When it comes time to stand tall, Rubio makes the 5-foot-1 Ginsburg look like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
After the nomination goes through the Judiciary Committee it’ll head to the full Senate, where just about every member’s stance on election-year nominations will contradict where they came down in 2016.
In 2016 we wrote in an editorial that Merrick Garland “deserves a fair hearing, and an up-or-down vote.” We’re not abandoning that principle now.
We’re not asking Rubio to live up to our ideals. We’re wondering if he’s capable of living up to his own.
Both Republicans and Democrats should stand by the principles they adopted that year. For Republicans who control the Senate — McConnell in particular — that means acknowledging they have the power to confirm a nominee but that they will choose to wait until the people have spoken on the next president.
Our last wish is that the process would be marked by fairness and intellectual consistency. But we’re not kidding ourselves.
The Senate is now full of Marx Brothers and Sisters willing to lower their principles, like Rubio. The worst part is they are taking respect for the Supreme Court down with them.
Editorials are the opinion of the Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board and are written by one of its members or a designee. The editorial board consists of Opinion Editor Mike Lafferty, Jennifer A. Marcial Ocasio, Jay Reddick, David Whitley and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson. Send emails to insight@orlandosentinel.com.
