It's Wednesday, June 29 and Day 137 since Justice Antonin Scalia died and Mitch McConnell laid down his Supreme Court blockade: No meetings, no hearings, no votes on his replacement. It's also Day 100 since President Obama named Merrick Garland to be Scalia's replacement. What's the Senate doing today instead of considering the Supreme Court nominee?
They're not even recognizing that the nomination is 100 days old. In case you're curious, the longest wait any Supreme Court nominee has had from nomination to confirmation is 125 days. The average time lapse between nomination and confirmation, withdrawal, or rejection is 25 days. So there's that.
While they're not doing that, they're doing their traditional jamming of a crappy, must-pass bill through before a holiday weekend. In this case, it's Puerto Rico's debt restructuring to keep the territory from defaulting on a debt payment on Friday. This Friday. The day after tomorrow. There's a lot in the bill that Democrats object to, primarily that it creates a control board that doesn't include any representation from the Puerto Rican people. It's a lot like those emergency managers in Michigan.
But with the House gone on recess already, if the Senate doesn't pass their bill, there's little option for Puerto Rico other than default. They'll take four votes late today, are likely to end up passing the bad House bill, then they'll all go home for the long weekend.
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