The importance of having a Democratic president name the next Supreme Court justice cannot be overstated, so if Senate Republicans won't allow a nomination through this year, then it’s up to us to make them pay the price and install a new Democratic majority come 2017. To help make that happen, Daily Kos launched a new round of Senate endorsements just over a week ago, and you’ve already contributed over $135,000 to the cause.
Now, as promised, we’re expanding the playing field further—this time, to Iowa, where GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley is up for re-election. Grassley, who’s been in the Senate since 1981, is no mere foot soldier in the GOP’s war on the Supreme Court: As chair of the Judiciary Committee, he’s Mitch McConnell’s top lieutenant in promoting the total blockade of any nominee Barack Obama might name to replace Antonin Scalia on the bench.
But Grassley, forced to defend the indefensible, is not holding up well under the glare of the spotlight. And that’s a serious problem for him, since he just earned his most formidable opponent in decades, former Lt. Gov. Patty Judge.
Grassley’s been accustomed to winning by wide margins every six years, but his outlook could be very different in 2016. A new PPP poll finds his job approval rating falling to a middling 47 percent positive/44 percent negative, a considerable drop from his 52-30 score just two months ago. What’s more, PPP’s survey also finds that Iowans want to see the Supreme Court vacancy filled this year, rather than kept open until next year, by a 56-40 margin—and all of this comes before a single attack ad has aired.
Judge, a farmer and a nurse who won two terms as state agriculture secretary before getting elected lieutenant governor in 2006, has already made it clear that she plans to go right at Grassley for advocating Washington dysfunction.
Please donate $3 so that Patty Judge can give Chuck Grassley the boot and help lift the GOP siege of the Supreme Court.
Judge kicked off her campaign by accusing Grassley, in a witty turn of phrase, of “obstructing justice,” then went on:
“I really believe that in recent years and particularly right now he’s kind of forgotten he’s from Iowa. He waited 36 years to become the chairman of the Judiciary Committee and now he’s refusing to do his job. That is not the Chuck Grassley that I knew 10 or 15 years ago and it’s not the thing Iowans want to see from their senator.”
Thanks to her public profile and her track record of winning statewide, Judge brings a credibility to this race that other alternatives lack, and she immediately puts a contest that had once been an afterthought on the map.
But there’s still no question that defeating Grassley poses a very difficult challenge. Among other things, he has a hefty $4 million in his campaign account, just waiting to be spent. That, however, is where we come in: Daily Kos is endorsing Judge to help make sure she has the resources she needs to expose Grassley's obstructionism—and to help turn this seat from red to blue.
Democrats need four seats to take back the Senate. Wouldn’t it be especially sweet if Grassley’s was one of them?
Please donate $3 to help Patty Judge make Chuck Grassley pay a price for the GOP’s war on the Supreme Court.