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President Steve Bannon popular vote loser Donald Trump is clearly hoping that he can change the subject from his Muslim ban by moving up his Supreme Court pick announcement to Tuesday in a prime-time address. Senate Democrats, however, are prepared.
With Trump prepared to announce his nominee on Tuesday evening, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said in an interview on Monday morning that he will filibuster any pick that is not Merrick Garland and that the vast majority of his caucus will oppose Trump’s nomination. That means Trump's nominee will need 60 votes to be confirmed by the Senate.
“This is a stolen seat. This is the first time a Senate majority has stolen a seat,” Merkley said in an interview. “We will use every lever in our power to stop this.” […]
Any senator can object to swift approval of a nominee and require a supermajority. Asked directly if he would do that, Merkley replied: “I will definitely object to a simple majority” vote.
It could blow up the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees, and Democrats are prepared for that fallout. The massive organic demonstrations around the country over the last two weekends, following Trump's inauguration and his Muslim ban, and the thousands of calls and emails and office visits they're getting might just be helping shore up their spines.
But it can't just be filibustering a SCOTUS pick. Senate Democrats have the power to block and delay Trump's agenda. Former Sen. Harry Reid's deputy chief of staff Adam Jentleson explained how in a must-read piece this weekend.
Senate Democrats have a powerful tool at their disposal, if they choose to use it, for resisting a president who has no mandate and cannot claim to embody the popular will. That tool lies in the simple but fitting act of withholding consent. An organized effort to do so on the Senate floor can bring the body to its knees and block or severely slow down the agenda of a president who does not represent the majority of Americans.
The procedure for withholding consent is straightforward, but deploying it is tricky. For the Senate to move in a timely fashion on any order of business, it must obtain unanimous support from its members. But if a single senator objects to a consent agreement, McConnell, now majority leader, will be forced to resort to time-consuming procedural steps through the cloture process, which takes four days to confirm nominees and seven days to advance any piece of legislation—and that’s without amendment votes, each of which can be subjected to a several-day cloture process as well.
This means having a Democrat on the floor whenever the Senate is in session. That's not a big hurdle. We've seen it in action by Republicans for all the years of President Obama's tenure. It doesn't take much work, but it takes a willingness on the part of Democrats to force Republicans to fight for every bit of Trump's twisted agenda, and thereby own it.