Now That We Have a Supreme Court Nominee, Tell GOP Senators to Do Their Job

Now That We Have a Supreme Court Nominee, Tell GOP Senators to Do Their Job

Now That We Have a Supreme Court Nominee, Tell GOP Senators to Do Their Job

Senate Republicans are still refusing to even consider Merrick Garland, President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court.

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What’s going on?

With his nomination of Merrick Garland to fill the Supreme Court vacancy left after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, President Obama was doing his job. Republicans in the Senate have not wasted any time letting the American people know that they plan to refuse to do theirs.

Senator Mitch McConnell responded to the nomination like this: “The American people are perfectly capable of having their say on this issue, so let’s give them a voice. Let’s let the American people decide.” Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley declared, “The American people shouldn’t be denied a voice.”

Senator McConnell and Senator Grassley are absolutely right about the critical role of the electorate. The issue is, as Nan Aron and Kyle C. Barry wrote in The Nation, the election to determine who would appoint this Supreme Court nominee already happened, “in 2012, when the American people elected President Obama to another four-year term that still has 11 months remaining.”

What can I do?

Sign our petition with Alliance for Justice demanding that the Senate give President Obama’s nominee a fair hearing and an up-and-down vote.

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Merrick Garland is not the first choice of many progressives, and President Obama did not increase diversity within the court by picking a woman or a person of color. Shortly after the nomination, The Nation‘s George Zornick looked at what Obama’s relatively safe pick means for the grassroots push for a vote. Earlier in the week, David Rudenstine deeply detailed Scalia’s legacy.

We cannot back down

We now confront a second Trump presidency.

There’s not a moment to lose. We must harness our fears, our grief, and yes, our anger, to resist the dangerous policies Donald Trump will unleash on our country. We rededicate ourselves to our role as journalists and writers of principle and conscience.

Today, we also steel ourselves for the fight ahead. It will demand a fearless spirit, an informed mind, wise analysis, and humane resistance. We face the enactment of Project 2025, a far-right supreme court, political authoritarianism, increasing inequality and record homelessness, a looming climate crisis, and conflicts abroad. The Nation will expose and propose, nurture investigative reporting, and stand together as a community to keep hope and possibility alive. The Nation’s work will continue—as it has in good and not-so-good times—to develop alternative ideas and visions, to deepen our mission of truth-telling and deep reporting, and to further solidarity in a nation divided.

Armed with a remarkable 160 years of bold, independent journalism, our mandate today remains the same as when abolitionists first founded The Nation—to uphold the principles of democracy and freedom, serve as a beacon through the darkest days of resistance, and to envision and struggle for a brighter future.

The day is dark, the forces arrayed are tenacious, but as the late Nation editorial board member Toni Morrison wrote “No! This is precisely the time when artists go to work. There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.”

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Onwards,

Katrina vanden Heuvel
Editorial Director and Publisher, The Nation

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