U.S. Supreme Court: Post-Ginsburg Edition

If every other Dem is available to vote, Harris could break the tie.

so the real question is which other grasping Dem Senator would hold the confirmation hostage until after the election

gives Sinema a chance for a last "Fuck you"

Would a six month battle over a Supreme Court nomination help or hurt Biden?

my point being Sotomayor resigning now is not at all a lock on Democrats being able to replace her with someone of their choosing

But a better chance than if Trump wins.

I agree it's not as clearcut a case as RBG, who should have stepped down as soon as Obama was reelected.

Now, if we end up with Biden reelected but a GOP majority in the Senate, I guess Sotomayor will have to sit tight and see if the Dems can take the Senate back in '26.

like, how many Dem Senators are up for re-election in November in red or purple states who would be just fine with defying Biden over a "too liberal" Supreme Court pick to burnish their centrist bona fides during high election season

Manchin said he wouldn't vote yes if a single Republican didn't.

Collins, Murk, and Romney all joined the Dems for Kentanji Jackson last time. since Manchin and Murk/Collins usually vote as a bloc, I'm having a hard time believing they wouldn't again this time. Collins and Murk are still hurt about being left holding the bag w/ abortion and Kavanaugh (even though it was their fucking fault).

Pressure would be intense on all Republicans to vote in lockstep. Maybe a replacement would go through, but it's not a no-brainer at this point.

pressure was intense on them to do it last time. yeah, it's not a sure bet, but it'd at least make it out of committee and there would be room to maneuver, which it most certainly would not in a Republican Senate.

I don't know how I feel on the issue, but Manchin was also talking about nominees in general and not SCOTUS nominees when he spoke, and the candidate in question had been labeled "anti-Semitic", which doomed his nomination with Ds and Rs alike (which is, yes, fucked up...but practically speaking, not a promise that he's going to sod a SCOTUS nomination).

Don't underestimate the likelihood that the current Supreme Court, or even the Supreme Court minus one, may very well be in a position to decide the next election. Again.

Is this a good time for Justice Sotomayor to resign? I think we should let her be the judge of that.

the justice of that you mean

*checks film*
i say we don’t truss lol

Is this a good time for Justice Sotomayor to resign? I think we should let her be the judge of that.

― more difficult than I look (Aimless), Wednesday, April 3, 2024 2:30 PM (six hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

what is public service apart from the opportunity for self-aggrandizement, after all

it seems to me that, to the extent it exists, the aggrandizement of every justice on the court was accomplished largely due to the president's nomination and the votes of at least half the senate.

as for sotomayor resigning, it might be of great value according to various political calculations, but I hesitate to call her resignation a form of 'public service' when 'political calculation' seems to cover it much more accurately.

she’s a cog in the machine and her time’s up. that’s all there is to it. miss me with this hero worship bullshit

absolutely insane you could have lived through the last 5 years and feel otherwise.

gee, that would hit hard, if I'd even hinted that I worshiped her as a hero. but I don't. so, who's engaging in bullshit here?

christ, now I'm insane?!

Well you do roll with that posse of clowns

citation needed

fucking libs

take your fucking testosterone-driven blurting of whatever nonsense your emotions tell you is real and shove it up your nostrils, sir. I reject your innuendoes and bullshit imputations. go sit on something sharp.

I've taken ten minutes to step away and cool down a bit. But, jesus christ, kev, if I am a fucking liberal, does that make you some kind of fire-breathing radical? a revolutionary? a political savant?

Talking smack on the internet as if you have anything to offer but your anger and you get to direct it at anyone you please on whatever slender disagreement sets you off is goddamn tiresome. And it's not just you. It's half the clowns on the internet and I get fucking tired of it. It isn't radical or revolutionary, it's just as reactionary and stupid as it sounds, but you can't hear yourself.

Aimless, a real chance exists that we'll re-elect Donald Trump. If so -- well, I don't need to explain a thing. Sotomayor's health also means that a real chance exists that she'll die or become incapacitated. Better for her to resign now.

Is there any guarantee Biden gets Sotomayor's replacement through before the election? Or even gets to choose the replacement?

Biden has the power to nominate, the Senate (with Democrats in control) confirm.

Thanks Alfred

be very surprised if she resigned. gerontocracy/entitlement stuff in politics transcends ideological boundaries, methods of gov't, etc. some fantasy scenario in which a dear friend gently engages her on the question and her conscience responds is probably yr best bet here, good luck

I mean, piss on this guy:

In any event, agreement or disagreement, joke or no joke, in my 28 years on the court I did not hear a voice raised in anger in that conference, nor were snide or personal remarks ever made. The discussion was professional, disagreements reflected legal differences on the merits, and the justices tried to find ways to reach court agreements.

Justice O’Connor maintained that a highly important informal court rule was this: You and I may disagree strongly in respect to Case 1, but that fact has nothing to do with our positions in respect to (not legally related) Case 2, where we may be the strongest of allies. That is, no horse-trading.

After conference we would have lunch, often talking about sports or trading so-called jokes and other nonlegal matters. I remember once saying to Chief Justice Rehnquist that I thought it amazing that we were about to have a pleasant lunch when just 20 minutes before at conference we strongly disagreed about applicable law. His reply suggested that he thought only a short time earlier that half the court thought the other half had lost its mind.

What works for nine people with lifetime appointments won’t work for the entire nation, but listening to one another in search of a consensus might help.

Seriously. Fuck comity, who cares if they get along, or go hunting together, or play chess or go birdwatching. I'd rather they all realize the damage being done to the country and its institutions, including theirs.

I don't know what the point of the Breyer piece was. I kept waiting for a transitioh ("But on today's court...") that never came.

The next person to mention Nino 'n' Ruth loving opera gets a pillow to the face. I keep hearing wonders about their friendship; I watch videos of their public appearances where he snaps at her, talks over her, and grimaces in her direction while she takes it.

I don't know what the point of the Breyer piece was. I kept waiting for a transitioh ("But on today's court...") that never came

My take is that was point, that nothing from prior generations has any bearing on the present in U.S. politics and certainly not the future, albeit one Breyer accidentally stumbled upon?

It was a eulogy for "things just working"

Nostalgia for a time when Democrats and Republicans could get along to “end welfare as we know it”.

the Senate (with Democrats in control) confirm

As pointed out previously, Senator Manchin has already announced he will not vote to confirm any judicial nominee who doesn't also get a Republican vote. Recent history teaches that the current 49 Republican senators will vote on SCOTUS nominations as a solid phalanx. If that holds true again (and I'm sure it will) then it would require all 50 remaining Democratic senators to vote to confirm. That includes Senator Sinema. Only then could VP Harris cast the tie-breaking vote.

The politics of this stand-off ensure that the chances that any notably progressive nominee getting confirmed are very remote. Unless the senate confirms someone, Sotomayor's seat would remain vacant after her resignation took effect. In contrast, Sotomayor is a known quantity and a reliable justice, her position is notoriously a lifetime appointment, and she could fill the seat until her death and that could be a decade or more away.

There's plenty of reasons why her resignation right now should be viewed as a massive gamble that could swing the court even further right. But the whole Ginsburg debacle has traumatized people and they are unwilling to see this situation a anything but a reprise, when it is in fact its own dilemma requiring fresh calculations based entirely on today's politics.

That's my insane take on it.

Unless the senate confirms someone, Sotomayor's seat would remain vacant after her resignation took effect.

I'd like to enlarge on that. Since the pro-resignation position is that Biden must fill her vacancy before the election in November, Sotomayor's resignation would certainly be dated to occur after the current SCOTUS session ends in June and before the next session begins in October. This would inevitably make the confirmation of her replacement be 100% about the presidential election.

McConnell would understand this and use it to maximum advantage -- and the greatest possible advantage his party could derive would be if Sotomayor's seat was still vacant on the day of the election. Conventional wisdom about this presidential election is that voters aren't highly motivated by either candidate. Turnout is seen as the key. If the election hinges on reproductive rights, as the Democrats prefer, then they already have a great motivator in their hands for their voters to turn out. If the Republicans can force the election to be about filling a vacant SCOTUS seat, that fight would eclipse reproductive rights and hand the Republicans who dislike Trump a get-out-of-guilt free pass to vote for him.

But even if the nominee is confirmed in a 50-50 vote with tie-breaker so that Sotomayor's seat is filled by October 1, the brouhaha over confirmation would dominate the election cycle and hand the opposition a lovely, fresh, new grievance to harp on. My sense is that forcing Sotomayor to resign would put Biden's re-election hopes into a paper boat and launch it into some heavy rapids. It's not worth the risk.

"a massive gamble" not really

It is both allowed and common for Justices to announce their retirement contingent on confirmation of a successor. In fact, Biden could nominate and the Senate could confirm a new SCOTUS Justice *without* an announced retirement, and just stockpile it until a vacancy arose. https://t.co/elXUnPXcP2

— Matt Glassman (@MattGlassman312) April 8, 2024

Totally sounds like something Joe Biden would do

just because Joe Biden is a fucking idiot I have to pretend aimless is right?

Biden could nominate and the Senate could confirm a new SCOTUS Justice *without* an announced retirement, and just stockpile it until a vacancy arose.

I can recall SCOTUS confirmations going back to the withdrawal of the Abe Fortas nomination during the LBJ administration. I cannot recall a Senate-confirmed justice ever being "stockpiled" just in case a sitting justice ever felt like resigning. If this is so common as all that, perhaps Matt Glassman might have cited some recent examples.

the stockpiling scenario is an observation about how the rules are written, not a suggestion. conditional retirement is the thing he's saying is common.

in any case your post rests on a procedural assumption that is not true, and the reality is the tautological argument for not doing this is "Sotomayor and Biden would not do it".

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GKmLwV-WMAEbo33?format=jpg&name=large

Can you condition your retirement on your replacement being picked by the current President?

Or withdraw your retirement if the wrong guy wins the Presidency?
Maybe. But these are not things Washington people do.

i'm not saying Biden and the democratic majority would *actually* do something that might appear gauche to like 4 columnists (3 NYT, 1 WaPo). I'm just saying they *should*, and the excuse aimless gives for their inaction is bs.

President Keyes is putting his finger on some excellent questions. I'll step aside and see if there are any good answers before offering any of the further questions I have in mind.

🙄