Posted on 06/27/2020 5:24:23 PM PDT by BillyBoy
Josh Hawley warns Trump on Supreme Court disappointments By MARIANNE LEVINE President Donald Trump counts reshaping the judiciary as one of his greatest accomplishments. But some top conservatives say his vaunted process for picking Supreme Court nominees needs to be revamped. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) said in an interview that the high court’s latest string of left-leaning rulings suggests Trump should reconsider his vow to release a new list of potential Supreme Court nominees by September in his bid to win over socially conservative voters. “I don’t love the idea of just doing over what we have been doing in the past,” Hawley said. “The idea of issuing a new list, if it’s just going to be the same stuff and the same process, I mean I’m not wild about it. … When it comes to this whole process, we have to ask ourselves, is this vetting process, is this really working?” Trump has made the confirmation of 200 federal judges, including two Supreme Court justices, a significant part of his reelection campaign. But Hawley said religious conservatives right now are “very depressed,” particularly after Justice Neil Gorsuch, a Trump pick, wrote the decision providing LGBTQ workers with federal workplace protections. The disappointment comes as Trump can’t afford to lose a key part of his base amid fast-sinking polls. And the Supreme Court could deal another blow to conservatives soon in a case centering on a Louisiana anti-abortion law. Hawley said grassroots religious conservatives need to be much more involved in the Supreme Court discussions going forward given their political clout, and he offered a reminder to his friends in “the legal conservative project.” “Who actually goes out and votes for judges?” said Hawley. “It’s conservative Catholics, conservative Jews, evangelicals, Mormons. That coalition of folks is vitally important to the Republican Party. I think they feel just shocked at what's going on with the Supreme Court, so I think it’s vital that they be heard from and involved in this process.” Trump first released a list of possible Supreme Court nominees in May 2016 with input from conservatives affiliated with The Federalist Society and The Heritage Foundation. The names helped ease concerns about the GOP nominee, and many credit the move with encouraging evangelicals to come to the polls. Hawley, himself a former Supreme Court clerk, has been vocal lately in his criticism of the high court. But unlike other Republicans who share his frustrations and supported Gorsuch, Hawley is the first to take issue with the process employed so far to pick Trump appointments. Hawley’s effort to seize on the issue also offers a window into a possible 2024 presidential campaign that relies on a populist, socially conservative message. Top officials in conservative legal groups counter that religious organizations have always been involved and say that while they disagree with some of the Supreme Court’s decisions, conservatives are seeing a net positive under Trump. They also say Trump should be praised for his transparency in releasing a list, arguing it helped win his 2016 campaign. “There is the more secretive and narrow process of judicial selection that brought us David Souter and John Roberts,” said Leonard Leo, who was involved in the Supreme Court confirmation of Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Gorsuch. “And there is the process that President Trump established and created which is to create as much transparency as possible by publishing a list for all conservatives to see and respond to.” Leo, a co-chairman of The Federalist Society, also pushed back on the idea that religious conservatives have been ignored. “I seriously doubt that any thoughtful religious conservative would trade the Supreme Court of today, in spite of some significant disappointing decisions, for the Supreme Court of 25, 30 or 40 years ago,” he said. “As compared with conservative performance in the broader battle over our culture, the conservative legal movement has posted significantly more gains. Obviously, more can be achieved and that’s precisely what the president is trying to accomplish as he enters into the election cycle this November.” The president hasn’t been shy about touting his record on judicial nominees. In a recent interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News, Trump said it was his top presidential achievement and predicted that close to 300 judges would be confirmed under his administration. But there are some signs of discontent. During his rally in Tulsa, Okla., when Trump touted Gorsuch’s confirmation, the crowd responded with boos. Carrie Severino, president of the conservative Judicial Crisis Network, praised Trump’s decision to publicly release a list, calling it a “bold” move. She also defended the vetting process for nominees and predicted Trump’s next list of Supreme Court nominees would also include a new pool of judges: appellate court nominees confirmed under his presidency. “That is a really different type of group than you had when Trump was choosing what to do. He was looking at largely Bush appointees,” Severino said. “Now he would have the opportunity to choose among Trump nominees ... [who] were chosen with specific interest in having a certain level of courage and principle in a way that the Bush administration wasn’t focusing on.” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who competed against Trump in 2016 and might seek the White House again one day, praised the president’s "leadership" on judicial nominees. “The last two weeks of decisions from the Court go to show just how important it is for President Trump to continue emphasizing the need to nominate strong justices to the bench who will defend the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and I look forward to seeing the revised list,” Cruz added. Others on the right, however, say the Supreme Court has accumulated too much power altogether, and that Congress and the administration need to do more to counter disappointing legal decisions through legislation and executive authority. “The future of the movement is going to have to be much more willing to address our political problems through the political process,” said Terry Schilling, executive director of American Principles Project. “Congress needs to be much more engaged. The president needs to be much more engaged.” Gabby Orr contributed to this report.
The GOP senator says the president needs to overhaul his process for picking nominees, in a swipe at top legal conservatives.
Hawley has a “C” for a Liberty Score. He’s not the conservative you want....unless you’re looking for a non-conservative.
https://www.conservativereview.com/scorecard/joshua-hawley/
Cruz should never be on the court.
He thinks Anwar al-Awlaki’s kids, born in Yemen to one citizen parent, are natural born citizens eligible to be President.
If he is, they are.
A reminder that by 1992, 8 of the 9 were GOP appointees. All but Byron White.
Blackmun, Souter, Stevens timed their resignations to turn their seat over to the DEMS.
It’s as if the GOP were populated mostly by RINO’s.
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It’s fact, the elected GOP are mostly Bush League Republicans.
Schumer’s threats are working.
[Hawley has a “C” for a Liberty Score. He’s not the conservative you want....unless you’re looking for a non-conservative.
https://www.conservativereview.com/scorecard/joshua-hawley/]
Lee voted against Trump’s Emergency Declaration that gave him the funds to build a wall. Hawley voted for it. Lee is in far-left Silicon Valley’s pocket. Hawley wants to regulate Silicon Valley in areas ranging from free speech issues to antitrust. Lee is against it. Bottom line - Conservative Review might as well be named Plutocratic Review, for all the attention it pays to grassroots conservative issues. Lip service to abortion won’t cut it any more.
We need a more descriptive term that smears them more.
Something along the lines of "Republicans For The Paycheck Only".
George H.W. Brush quit too when LaPierre referred to ATF as “jack booted thugs”.
“RINO’s”
We need a more descriptive term that smears them more.
Something along the lines of “Republicans For The Paycheck Only”.
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Corrupto’phants.
I kind of like Bush League Republican, it evokes the globalist open borders view most of them share with Democrats.
As I noted in post #48, I dispute Leonard Leo's argument that today's "conservative" SCOTUS is superior to the one we had 25-30 years ago, and we wouldn't want to trade them for the 1990s era Supreme Court hearing today's cases.
Even with the treasonous Souter and Stevens voting just like RAT appointees, I'd much rather risk the 1991-1992 era Rehnquist Court hearing the cases, than I would with the current justices on the Roberts court.
I think a number of the current 5-4 liberal "precedents" being established in 2020 would instead end up 6-3 VICTORIES for our side (Rehnquist, Scalia, Thomas, O'Connor, Kennedy, White) if those judges came forward in a time machine to hear today's cases.
Safely in the middle of Rapin Bill's first term: Blackmun [appointed by Richard Nixon] announced his retirement from the Supreme Court in April 1994 [age 85], four months before he officially left the bench, assuming retired status on August 3, 1994. By then, he had become the court's most liberal justice. In his place, President Bill Clinton nominated Stephen Breyer who was confirmed by the Senate 87–9.
We're still cursed with 82-year-old Breyer.
Made it to the Halfrican Reign of Error: Long before the election of President Zero, Souter [appointed by Grabby Poppy Bush] had expressed a desire to leave Washington, D.C., and return to his native New Hampshire.
The election of a Democommie president in 2008 made 70-year-old Souter more inclined to retire, but he did not want to create a situation in which there would be multiple vacancies at once. Souter [age 70] apparently became satisfied that no other justices planned to retire at the end of the Supreme Court's term in June 2009.
As a result, in mid-April 2009 he privately notified the White House of his intent to retire at the conclusion of that term. Souter sent The Kenyan Klown a retirement letter on May 1, effective at the start of the Supreme Court's 2009 summer recess. Later that day Oblabya made an unscheduled appearance during the daily White House press briefing to announce Souter's retirement.
On May 26, 2009, ClownBammy announced his nomination of federal appeals court judge Sonia Sotomayor. She was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on August 6.
Forunately, The Wide Latina is not so wise when it comes to her long-term health, so we may catch a break in Trump's second term.
Givin' another one to the Kenyan Klown: Stevens, age 90, [appointed by Gerald Ford] retired on June 29, 2010 as the third-longest-serving justice in the history of the Supreme Court with 34 years and six months of service and just three days short of tying the tenure of the second-longest serving justice in history, Stephen Johnson Field (1863–1897) who retired in December 1, 1897.
John Jerk Stevens' gift to us all is Elena Kagan.
Thanks, you drooling old Trotskyite.
We all remember that you attacked Brett Kavanaugh from your diaper-changing room because he had the temerity to defend himself from "charges" made up out of whole cloth by your fellow traveling Comrades in the Senate and the Media.
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Looking over this list of sordid turncoat-ism, I'll note that God has a couple of months to pay something down on the Dems' karma bill...
“bush league” has long been a term of disparagement for feckless amateurs...
“This has been problem for the GOP for quite some time.”
IIRC 21 of the past 28 SCOTUS oligarchs are GOP appointments. Each of the most destructive decisions over the past couple of generations was written by “GOP” justices.
I remember that here on FR. seems to have come to pass.damnit
But it was all OK, they said. He's an "originalist" judge, they said.
I know. I’ve been through the episcopal church disaster so I know all about this fraud of a church. So sad. The original Church of Colonial America I think. The reason for the separation of church and state. Because they didn’t want to be like England.
I now remember her.Jees
When a globalist like Bush puts up a fraud like Roberts, this is what happens, I guess.
Biggest problem is not with the process itself, it’s who is counseling the President on the credentials and McConnell. The President doesn’t know who any of these people are. He’s relying on the advice of others. I think he’s overwhelmed with how corrupt everything about DC is and how so many on “ the right” are Globalist/Uniparty a-holes.
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