Chuck Schumer sat down with the Associated Press on Thursday and delivered the softest possible threat with the hardest possible wording.
Democrats will not allow President Donald Trump to put "a right-winger" on the Supreme Court.
Not a moderate. Not a consensus pick. Not a guy who once shook hands with a Democrat at a golf outing. A right-winger. Which, translated from Schumer into English, means anybody Trump likes.
He would not say whether Democrats would hold a vacancy open until after the next presidential election the way Mitch McConnell did to Barack Obama in 2016. He did say they are "not going to allow any crappy nominees." Crappy. That's the technical legal term now. Somewhere a first-year associate just wrote "crappy" into a bench memo and cried.
NBC News put the math in adult language: Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices and a pile of lower-court judges, and with Democrats taking the Senate this week, he will struggle to extend that record for the next two years. Struggle. That's NBC for "the confirmation hearing will be a hostage video."
This is the same Chuck Schumer who spent yesterday insisting "the issue is not me" while planning to remain majority leader. The issue is never him. The issue is always the other guy's résumé, the other guy's ideology, the other guy's existence. Schumer has been in the Senate since the Clinton administration. He has outlasted three wars, four phones and every reformer who tried to replace him. The only thing he blocks faster than a Trump nominee is a primary challenger.
Here's the part they won't put on a lawn sign. When Republicans held the seat open in 2016, Democrats called it theft, a crisis, the death of norms, democracy's last gasp. Now Schumer is floating the same move with a shrug and a press availability. Norms are like Uber receipts. Sacred when you're the passenger. Optional when you're driving.
Voters spent Tuesday screaming about grocery prices. Schumer spent Thursday drawing a chalk outline around the next Supreme Court vacancy. Affordability for thee. A litmus test for me. If a justice retires, the country gets a two-year vacancy and a lecture about how this is different because this time the bad people are the ones nominating.
Remy has a tip for the justices who might be thinking about golf: don't. Schumer just turned your retirement party into a hostage negotiation. Pack a lunch. Bring a book. The gavel stays cold until he says otherwise, and he has already said the quiet part with the volume of a fire alarm.
So congratulations, America. You asked for lower prices. You got a Senate majority that can't define "right-winger" but promises to spot one from across the room and bury the nomination under a mountain of procedural piety. That's not a confirmation process. That's a velvet rope with a filibuster.
The Demorat is a satire publication. This article is parody and commentary based on real news reports; jokes, exaggerations and fictional elements are not factual claims. Quotes attributed to real people are drawn from published reporting.
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