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Barrett Confirmation Hands Win to Trump, GOP on Eve of Election

The Senate confirmed Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court, giving the court a 6-3 conservative majority.

Barrett Confirmation Hands Win to Trump, GOP on Eve of Election
Amy Coney Barrett, associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, stands during a ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S. (Photographer: Chris Kleponis/CNP/Bloomberg)

Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation by the Senate Monday night was a touchstone accomplishment for President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans that solidifies a 6-3 conservative majority on the Supreme Court just eight days before the U.S. election.

The Senate confirmed Barrett on a partisan 52-48 vote, and Justice Clarence Thomas administered the first of two required oaths to Barrett on the South Lawn of the White House a short time later with Trump looking on. Chief Justice John Roberts will administer the second oath in a private ceremony at the Supreme Court on Tuesday, letting Barrett begin work as a justice.

Barrett Confirmation Hands Win to Trump, GOP on Eve of Election

Barrett may be asked to weigh in on cases that would determine the outcome of a close election, and is expected to vote on whether the Affordable Care Act is constitutional soon after she joins the court.

“This is a momentous day for America, for the United States Constitution, and for the fair and impartial rule of law,” Trump said. Barrett, he said, “will make an outstanding justice on the highest court in our land.”

Elevating the 48-year-old jurist helps fulfill a longstanding GOP goal of transforming the federal bench into a conservative legal bulwark. With the clearest anti-abortion record of any high court nominee in decades, Barrett’s appointment also is a major victory for Evangelical Christian groups that have loyally supported Republicans and are a crucial voting bloc for Trump as he heads into Election Day trailing Democrat Joe Biden.

“It’s a privilege to be asked to serve my country in this office and I stand here tonight truly honored and humbled,” Barrett said.

Barrett Confirmation Hands Win to Trump, GOP on Eve of Election

“This was a rigorous confirmation process, and I thank all of you, especially Leader McConnell and Chairman Graham, to help me navigate it,” referring to Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham, both facing re-election next week.

She thanked White House staff and the Department of Justice for advising her in the confirmation process. She vowed to separate her personal political leanings from her judicial decisions.

“It is the job of a judge to resist her policy preferences,” she said. “It would be a dereliction of duty to give in to them.”

Trump and his GOP allies in the Senate pushed for a quick confirmation of Barrett, and it came just 38 days after the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who for 27 years anchored the court’s liberal wing. Trump had said he wanted his replacement for Ginsburg in place to avoid a deadlocked court should the outcome of the presidential election depend on a ruling, as was the case in 2000.

All Democrats in the Senate voted against Barrett’s confirmation, as did Republicans Susan Collins of Maine, objecting to confirming a justice so close to the election.

The highly partisan vote on the confirmation mirrors the divisions in the country leading up to the election and on some of the issues that will be before the high court in the near future. Those issues include the validity of Obamacre and the status of the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that legalized abortion rights nationwide, as well as voting and civil rights.

The court is scheduled to hear arguments on the ACA a week after the election. The Trump administration is urging the court to declare the law invalid, including its protections for people with pre-existing health conditions.

The Mississippi attorney general, meanwhile, has pitched the court to take up her state’s ban on abortions after 15 weeks in a case that could sharply limit Roe and for the first time let states outlaw the procedure before a fetus becomes viable.

Barrett Confirmation Hands Win to Trump, GOP on Eve of Election

Trump has said he wants the justices he’s selected for the court -- there are now three of them -- to invalidate Obamacare and overturn Roe v. Wade.

The court is already addressing pre-election skirmishes over the rules for casting and counting ballots in the contest between Trump and Biden.

Just last week, the court deadlocked 4-4 on how many days Pennsylvania could wait after Election Day for mail-in votes to arrive, leaving in force a three-day extension for the receipt of absentee ballots in the pivotal state. Barrett could provide the fifth vote to overturn any state court ruling that expands voting, or otherwise favors Democrats.

The court also is scheduled to hear arguments Nov. 30 on Trump’s attempt to exclude undocumented immigrants from the 2020 census, a case that could determine the allocation of House seats and federal dollars.

Biden, in a statement released by his campaign on Monday night, said, “the rushed and unprecedented confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett as associate justice to the Supreme Court, in the middle of an ongoing election, should be a stark reminder to every American that your vote matters.”

Barrett has served on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals since 2017 and taught at Notre Dame Law School. In three days of testimony during her confirmation hearings, Barrett stressed she would be independent, while asserting she had no agenda but to follow the Constitution and the law. She deflected questions about how she might rule on issues such as abortion.

Barrett’s nomination so close to the election and the rapid confirmation process drew an angry response from Democrats, who pointed to the refusal of Senate Republicans to even give a hearing to President Barack Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, to fill a vacancy that arose in February 2016 because it was an election year.

While the number of justices has been set at nine since 1869, the Garland experience and the Barrett nomination has ignited a campaign by Democratic activists to expand the court in retaliation. The idea hasn’t been embraced by Biden or Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer.

Biden has said he would appoint a commission to consider court reform, while Schumer has said everything would be on the table next year if Democrats take back the Senate.

Republicans have long seen court battles as a key motivator for turning out their base, and Republican senators including Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham of South Carolina are pinning their re-election hopes in large part on their successful efforts to shift the courts to the right.

They won’t have to wait long see whether their efforts bear fruit at the ballot box.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.