Moments after Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement announcement Wednesday, the Democratic party sent out a fundraising email with the subject line: “If you steal a Supreme Court seat, you can do just about anything.”
The email from Deputy DNC Chair Keith Ellison (D-MN) decried the Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision Tuesday to uphold President Trump’s travel ban, comparing it to the infamous Dred Scott decision.
“The Supreme Court in the 1850s said that it was OK to own a black person, and that was the Dred Scott decision,” he wrote. “That decision hit the dustbin of history -- and the decision to uphold Trump's Muslim ban will too.”
The email claimed that the GOP “thinks that because they stole a Supreme Court seat and gave themselves a 5-4 majority, they can jam any racist, xenophobic, ugly policy down the throats of the American people.”
The claim that Republicans "stole" a Supreme Court seat likely refers to the confirmation of Justice Neil Gorsuch through the GOP employing the "nuclear option" to avoid a partisan filibuster as well as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's declining to fill the vacancy left by Scalia's death during the election year.
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“Republicans think there are no consequences for stealing a Supreme Court seat,” the email emphasized.
Audio of the DNC committee learning about Kennedy’s retirement on a conference call was tweeted by Politico’s David Siders Wednesday.
How it sounded inside a DNC committee meeting the moment Justice Kennedy’s retirement was announced pic.twitter.com/6S9uO2JGzQ
— David Siders (@davidsiders) June 27, 2018
McConnell announced shortly after the retirement news that a confirmation hearing and a floor vote for President Trump's pick to replace Kennedy will be happening this fall.
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