This was the week the mainstream media decided to notice that President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have been packing the lower courts with hard-right judges. The New York Times did a thing. Politico did a thing. I guess there was just enough of a break between Trump insulting widows for them to take a peek at what’s really going on.
There are many things that President Trump does that are not normal for an Earthling, much less a president. And there are many things that your median Republican voter can claim they “didn’t sign up for.” But the packing of the judiciary with all white, mostly male, conservatives and crackpots was PROMISED. It was promised by Trump, it was promised by GOP leadership. Every person who cast a vote for a Republican Senator. Every person who made a “Hillary Clinton’s emails” false equivalency. Every single person who voted for Jill freaking Stein or Gary Johnson because their petulant protest was more important than everything else. All of those people are COMPLICIT in what Trump and McConnell are doing to the judiciary.
“The judge story is an untold story; nobody wants to talk about it,” an enthusiastic Mr. Trump said during his impromptu appearance with Mr. McConnell. “But when you think about it, Mitch and I were saying, that has consequences 40 years out, depending on the age of the judge — but 40 years out.”
I don’t know why Republicans are better at understanding what courts do and why they’re important than Democrats, but they are better at it. Conservatives will hold their noses and vote for Republicans because they know that once Republicans are in power they will try to appoint judges who will claw back civil rights, destroy gay rights, and reduce women to incubators with mouthparts. They know that the only way that you can do some of these things is through the courts, because judges who interpret the Constitution to require EQUAL RIGHTS frustrate conservative legislative attempts.
Republicans understand that the Constitution says what nine people on the Supreme Court say it says. Democrats, for whatever reason, don’t seem to get that. They don’t get that their rights are on the ballot every election, even in the off-year elections when they’re choosing a third of the Senate.
They’re about to find out, though. From Neil Gorsuch on down, Trump and McConnell are relentlessly packing the courts with people who don’t believe that people in disadvantaged groups should have rights, much less constitutional protections. Some of these guys don’t even believe in secularism.
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The current poster boy for Trump’s judicial picks is Jeff Mateer. We’ve written about him before. He’s a real tool and some of his quotes are getting a lot of play.
Chief among their targets is Jeff Mateer, nominated to a federal judgeship in Texas, who in a past speech referred to transgender children as proof of “Satan’s plan.” Mateer, according to comments unearthed by CNN, has also implied that the 2015 Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage is “disgusting” and could lead to polygamy or bestiality.
“Guess what? I attend a conservative Baptist church. We discriminate, all right. On the basis of sexual orientation, we discriminate,” Jeff Mateer said in a 2015 speech at the National Religious Liberties Conference. “Does that mean I can’t be a judge? In some states, I think that’s true, unfortunately.”
The thing you have to understand is that Mateer’s views are not outside the “mainstream” of how conservative judges think. Sure, you won’t see Neil Gorsuch actually calling trans children part of Satan’s plan. He’s far too polished for that. But you can best believe that Neil Gorsuch will do NOTHING to protect the rights of trans children. He will be gleefully ignorant of their suffering.
Republican voters, every one of them, asked for judges who will treat something like trans issues as disgusting, Satanic behavior. Trump and McConnell are simply giving them what they want.
They’re ushering in a generation of hell. Just like they promised to.
Trump and McConnell See a Way to Make Conservatives Happy [New York Times]
Trump’s judge picks: ‘Not qualified,’ prolific bloggers [Politico]