With a hug, Feinstein draws liberal critics at end of hearings
WASHINGTON — It was the hug that may define — or doom — a long Senate career.
Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California embraced Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham at the close of confirmation hearings Thursday for President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, publicly thanking the chairman for a job well done.
“This has been one of the best set of hearings that I’ve participated in,” Feinstein said at the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Calls for her ouster from Democratic leadership were swift, unequivocal and relentless.
“It’s time for Sen. Feinstein to step down from her leadership position on the Senate Judiciary Committee,” said Brian Fallon, the executive director of Demand Justice, which opposes conservative nominees to the courts. “If she won’t, her colleagues need to intervene.”
Eli Zupnick, the spokesman for Fix Our Senate, said: “Senator Feinstein is absolutely wrong about what is happening in the Senate and in her Committee.”
He said in his statement that Republicans are trying to “jam” Barrett’s nomination through the Senate and it “should not be treated as a legitimate confirmation process.”
The response was not a knee-jerk reaction to an off-the-cuff moment between two longtime senators, but a slow-burning frustration among leading liberal advocates that the panel’s top Democrat is no longer the right fit for the job.
Supreme Court confirmation battles have gone from bipartisan Senate fare to bare-knuckle brawls.
Trump has been able to install more than 200 judges on the federal bench and is now poised to seat his third justice on the Supreme Court.
Feinstein’s office declined further comment, but pointed to the senator’s statement.
“Judiciary Committee Democrats had one goal this week: to show what’s at stake under a 6-3 conservative Supreme Court — and we did that,” Feinstein said.
Senate schedule planned
WASHINGTON — The Senate plans to take up the nomination of
U.S. Appeals Circuit Court Judge Amy Coney Barrett on Oct. 23 with a final vote expected the following week, CBS News reported Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell as saying.
“We’ll go to the floor on Friday the 23rd and stay on it until we finished. We have the votes,” CBS quoted Mcconnell, R-KY.
The Senate Judiciary Committee, which concluded four days of hearings on Barrett on Thursday, announced later in the day that it would vote Oct. 22 on Barrett’s nomination to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died on Sept. 18.
The full Senate will then have a debate, a procedural vote and more debate before a final vote.
Newsmax