Posted on 04/07/2017 1:06:39 PM PDT by pogo101
Rank your recommended "List of 21" nominees for any future Trump SCOTUS nominations! (Obviously we are recommending "in the abstract," i.e., without knowing what the current political weather will be when a vacancy arises. If another "Access: Hollywood" recording comes out, Trump will be hard-pressed to pick a woman, etc.)
My considerations, in order of importance, are:
1. Clearly constitutionalist. If we blow it on this point, the rest doesn't matter. Never forget that Brennan, Warren, Blackmun and Souter were all REPUBLICAN nominees.
2. Sufficiently non-controversial, so that we don't lose squish GOP Senators like Collins and Murkowski. (This will move downward in priority if the GOP has more than its current 52 seats when the next vacancy arises.)
3. Youth (or more precisely, how long the nominee is likely to serve)
4. Charisma -- how well will the nominee impress moderate voters?
5. Is picking this judge going to help Trump / the GOP down the road? (E.g., picking Gorsuch, from Colorado, may help swing that purple state into the red.)
Before we offer our opinions, note two things:
1. Neil Gorsuch was a 10/10 on all of these factors; and 2. I'm limiting my choices to Trump's "List of 21," but neither you nor Trump necessarily need do so.
Thomas Hardiman
Hardiman is another great pick who was the other finalist with Gorsuch.
One sterling “bulletproof”-ing quality to Hardiman is that even the lefty ABA rated him unanimously Well Qualified for his 2006 appointment. Makes it hard for the Senate Dems (although they will, of course, all vote no anyway).
“True, but something tells me DT WILL GET 2 more.”
Has someone offered them all expense paid stays at Cibolo Creek Ranch?
Yeah, Bannon was still of his promise-keeping influence.
I don’t believe Cruz would be an easy pick at all. Cruz was reviled in the Senate both before and after his filibuster effort on defunding Obamacare. I doubt the squish Senators like Murkowski of AK or Collins of ME would be supporters of his at all. That’s not to say I wouldn’t support a Cruz nomination, I certainly would.
My choices from the list of 21 would be Mike Lee of Utah, Tom Pryor, and Margaret Ryan (she’d be an easy choice for the female side of the Senate, both R and D) a candidate with military experience and one that isn’t Ivy League.
This thread is a discussion of SCOTUS picks. So start your own vanity about the 126 open seats that need filled. Damn!
Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. Donation to the FReepathon made.
First, Cruz isn’t on the list, and IMHO there is no reason to deviate from it. Picking from the list checks a box, and it puts the Democrat senators from purple states in a bind. Out of the 25 (half!) of the Democrat caucus in the Senate whose terms expire in 2019, ten of them are from states Trump won. Which is to say, from states whose voters voted for that list when they voted for POTUS last November.Otherwise, I would think that the Republican Senate caucus would like to see Cruz leave the Senate, and naming him to SCOTUS would constitute “kicking him upstairs” - and obviating the need to contend with him in the Senate.
Democrats have, by “filibustering” Justice Gorsuch (heh, heh!) made themselves irrelevant as a consideration in selecting any future nominee when they do not have a majority (and we already know that they would make the Republicans irrelevant when next they have a Senate majority). Consequently there was nothing for the Republicans to lose by disallowing a filibuster. And that clarifies the situation if Trump does get other picks. In the best case, two more vacancies occur before 2019 - and Trump fills them with Scalia clones. The Democrats will have nothing to say that they have not already forced the Republicans to make irrelevant.
Kennedy, maybe Breyer. Heard Thomsd wants to retire.
Trump should throw a trail ballon out there that he might nominate Merrick Garland just to watch Chuckles Schumer head explode...
Just kidding chuckie....
Margaret Ryan would be superb choice. Clerked for Luttig and then Thomas.
You mean William H. Pryor. He'd be great if confirmed, but I would avoid him with only 52 GOPs because he'd scare off too many squishes.
Ping
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