President Joe Biden announced his response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to strip abortion rights from millions of Americans Friday. Since it’s protecting abortion rights day for the administration, it would also be a very good day for Biden to publicly announce that he has made no deal with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to nominate any forced birther candidates to any lifetime appointments.
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear (D) had not been notified that Biden’s deal with McConnell to give forced birther Chad Meredith a seat on the federal bench was off. “It’s been plenty of time,” Beshear said at a press conference Thursday afternoon. “And by now, they should be telling us that it’s going to be rescinded.”
In his Thursday press conference, Beshear said he hadn’t received “any definitive reason” for the Meredith nomination and would not comment “on any other discussions we have with the White House.” But he did emphasize, “I certainly hope that they will back off,” meaning the White House dropping this nomination.
“Certainly, you can expect in any conversations on this I will continue to tell them that this is not an acceptable nomination, and I and the rest of Kentucky will oppose it,” he said.
Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern reported that a source with connections to the governor’s office said that McConnell would “allow Biden to nominate and confirm two U.S. Attorneys to Kentucky” in return for Meredith’s nomination, a remarkably bad deal for Biden for many reasons, not the least of which is giving a lifetime appointment to someone in the mold of Supreme Court Justices Thomas and Scalia. When the court has undertaken a judicial coup with a range of horrific decisions. For two U.S. attorneys who could serve for four years, if they weren’t blocked by Republicans who aren’t McConnell.
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The White House still isn’t commenting. “This is a vacancy,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Thursday. “It’s not something that we’re going to comment on. We don’t comment on executive branch or judicial vacancies. We have not made a nomination yet.”
They have just informed Beshear and Rep. John Yarmuth, the senior Democrat in the Kentucky delegation, that the nomination would happen—it was actually supposed to be official on June 24, the same day the court handed down its reversal of Roe, and two days after a longtime friend of McConnell vacated the seat for Meredith. Judge Karen Kaye Caldwell, a George W. Bush nominee, officially submitted her move to senior status on the district court on June 22. That left the vacancy for Meredith.
Beshear was unstinting in his criticism of the deal and of Meredith Thursday. “The fact that this individual assisted former Gov. Bevin with the worst misuse or abuse of gubernatorial power—certainly in my lifetime—should be disqualifying,” Beshear said. “And this is the deputy general counsel who worked on pardons that allow rapists and murderers to walk free.”
That association with Bevin and the scandal of his pardons was enough to tank McConnell’s efforts to get Trump to nominate Meredith to a judgeship. Not one to let ethics or integrity get in the way of raw power, McConnell kept pressing and somehow got someone in the White House to think this was a good idea.
At least two Democratic senators are telling Biden to give it up. Nevada Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen criticized the planned nomination and said they would vote against Meredith if it moved forward.
“Senator Cortez Masto is opposed to anti-choice judicial nominees,” said Lauren Wodarski, a spokesperson for Cortez Masto. “With women’s reproductive rights under attack across the country, she has no intention of supporting such a nominee now. Should Mr. Meredith be nominated, she will vote against him.”
“Sen. Rosen has consistently opposed federal judicial nominees who have displayed outwardly anti-choice views and will continue to do so,” said Joe Bush, a spokesperson for Rosen. “In light of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade and Republican efforts at the state and federal level to ban abortion, Sen. Rosen has called on President Biden to use every available tool at his disposal to protect reproductive rights.” Which does not include appointing another forced birther judge.
As of now Senate leadership isn’t commenting publicly, with neither Majority Leader Chuck Schumer nor Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin weighing in. They’d better be doing so privately and letting the White House know that this nomination cannot be made. Officially nominating Meredith would be a political disaster, alienating the abortion rights supporters and putting Democratic senators in a terrible position.
Biden needs to end this embarrassing fiasco now, before it gets any worse.
Privacy as a foundational value in a post-Roe landscape on Daily Kos' The Brief podcast
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