A simple I regret my poor decision to threaten two Supreme Court justices would have worked fine here, but eh.
NEW stmt from Schumer spox: For Justice Roberts to follow the right wings deliberate misinterpretation of what Sen Schumer said, while remaining silent when Pres Trump attacked Justices Sotomayor & Ginsberg last week, shows Justice Roberts does not just call balls and strikes. pic.twitter.com/9908ZAeNkz
Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) March 4, 2020
Lets go in order. Schumers comments earlier werent a reference to the political price Senate Republicans will pay for confirming Gorsuch and Kavanaugh. Its insulting to our collective intelligence for him to claim that it was. He couldnt have been clearer that he was addressing the justices directly, not Republicans.
Did Senate Democrat leader Schumer just threaten two conservative justices? Where is the media?
I want to tell you Justice Kavanaugh and Justice Gorsuch: You have unleashed a whirlwind, and you will pay the pricepic.twitter.com/MellytNNp5
Mark Meadows (@RepMarkMeadows) March 4, 2020
You, Gorsuch! You, Kavanaugh! Do we have two dudes in the Senate named Gorsuch and Kavanaugh that I dont know about?
Theres no better evidence of how badly he messed up than that his own spokesman is forced to resort to a blatantly untrue interpretation of what happened to find some sort of not-terrible spin for it.
You wont know what hit you also makes no sense except as a threat when aimed at a Supreme Court justice. What do Gorsuch and Kavanaugh care if they unleash a major grassroots movement in favor of abortion? Theyre life-tenured. Theyre not going to be voted out. Theres no price to pay, unless Schumer means stringing them up. If hes talking about a political price, the worst-case scenario is that Democrats ride the backlash against pro-life decisions to total control of government, appoint a bunch of liberals to fill Court vacancies, and we end up with a constitutional regime in which abortion on demand is legal at every stage of pregnancy. Which is what we, um, have now.
Roberts does not call balls and strikes? Well, hes called out Trump before for criticizing federal judges whove ruled against him, and Trump was far more genteel in those cases than Schumers you will pay the price garbage today. Trump critics frequently ask What if Obama did it? to point out righty hypocrisy about some misdeed that Trumps committed, but today we can play What if Trump did it? about Schumers comments. What if Trump dropped a you wont know what hit you on the Notorious RBG? Wed be in for days of whither our norms? coverage.
And that coverage would be justified.
Schumer's threat to the Court that "you will pay the price" is a direct attack on the integrity of our courts. I criticized Trump for his reckless comments about the courts. Where is the chorus of condemnation of Schumer? Schumer sounded more like a stalker than a statesman.
Jonathan Turley (@JonathanTurley) March 4, 2020
I agree with Ed that Schumers threat is an empty one. The man is a putzhead, as Al DAmato once famously said, and the left is never more feral and bloodthirsty than when abortion is involved but I doubt he seriously meant to propose physical harm. He probably got caught up in the moment standing in front of the Court, whipping up a crowd about the cherished right of infanticide thats not actually enshrined in the Constitution, still a little high from last nights establishment demolition of Bernie Sanders on Super Tuesday. He may have been reaching for a rhetorical flourish to express that the left will rally if Roe is overturned. Youll hear from us at the polls! became You will pay the price! You wont know what hit you! because, well, thats what happens when a putzhead tries to orate.
But he probably didnt mean it wouldnt get Trump off the hook for saying something like this, so why should it get Schumer off? Let him wear it every time the Democrats lecture about norms going forward. Especially if he wont forthrightly apologize.