McConnell, Trump Court Takeover Scheme “Stinks”

Washington, D.C., October 26, 2017 – Following the announcement today that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has filed cloture on four circuit court nominees at once, Amy Coney Barrett, Joan Larsen, Stephanos Bibas, and Allison Eid, who will now come up for floor votes next week, AFJ President Nan Aron released the following statement:

“This is the Trump-GOP court takeover strategy in all its glory: flooding the system with nominees, rushing hearings, cutting corners on vetting, and ditching norms and rules to make sure these extreme nominees get waved through the process. It’s frankly outrageous, especially since the American people are unlikely to realize just how dangerous these nominees are until it’s too late. If Trump’s court-packing is allowed to run its course, the America we know today will be a very different place in the future as rights and freedoms we have come to rely on are stripped away. And Mitch McConnell is abetting all of this because of his dark-money masters on the right, who threatened to take out attack ads unless he gave them the judges they want. The whole thing stinks.”