GOP senators power Barrett toward high court confirmation

Overpowering Democratic opposition, Senate Republicans are set to confirm Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, approving President Donald Trump’s nominee a week before Election Day and securing likely conservative court dominance for years to come.

Trump’s choice to fill the vacancy of the late liberal icon Ruth Bader Ginsburg potentially opens a new era of rulings on abortion, the

Affordable Care Act and even a potential dispute over his own election. Democrats have been powerless to stop Trump’s third justice as Republicans race to reshape the judiciary

Barrett is just 48, and her confirmation will solidify the court’s rightward tilt.

Monday’s vote is the closest high court confirmation ever to a presidential election, and the first in modern times with no support from the minority party. The spiking COVID-19 crisis has hung over the proceedings.

Vice President Mike Pence’s office said Monday he would not preside over the Senate session unless his tie-breaking vote is needed after Democrats asked him to stay away when his aides tested positive for COVID-19.

With Barrett’s confirmation all but assured, Trump was expected to celebrate with an event at the White House after the late-evening vote.

“This is something to be really proud of and feel good about,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said during a rare weekend session Sunday ahead of voting. He scoffed at the “apocalyptic” warnings from critics that the judicial branch was becoming mired in partisan politics, even as he declared that “they won’t be able to do much about this for a long time to come.”

Pence’s presence presiding for the vote would have been expected, part of the Republican celebration. But Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and his leadership team said that it would not only violate virus guidelines of the Centers for Disease

Control and Prevention, “it would also be a violation of common decency and courtesy.”

Some GOP senators tested positive for the coronavirus following a Rose Garden event with Trump to announce Barrett’s nomination, but they have since said they have been cleared by their doctors from quarantine. Pence’s office said the vice president tested negative for the virus on Monday.

Democrats argued for weeks that the vote was being improperly rushed and then during an all-night session that it should be up to the winner of the Nov. 3 election to name the nominee. However, Barrett, a federal appeals court judge from Indiana, is expected to be seated swiftly, and begin hearing cases.

Several pre-election matters are awaiting decision just a week before Election Day, and she could be a decisive vote in Republican appeals of court orders extending the deadline for absentee ballots in North Carolina and Pennsylvania.