United States Senate

[GreyhoundFan]

I love Lindsey getting called out on his hypocrisy:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

McTurtle's hypocrisy knows no bounds: "McConnell: Republicans would confirm a justice during 2020 election"

Spoiler

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on Tuesday that Republicans would fill an opening on the Supreme Court if there were a vacancy next year — in contrast with 2016, when he stated his fierce opposition to confirming a justice in the last year of a president’s term.

At a Paducah (Kentucky) Area Chamber of Commerce lunch, McConnell was asked about how he would handle an opening if a justice were to die in 2020, when President Donald Trump is up for reelection. McConnell confidently replied, “Oh, we’d fill it.”

CNN first reported McConnell’s remarks, which were broadcast on WPSD-TV.

The Senate majority leader’s stance contrasts with his handling of President Barack Obama’s nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to replace Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February 2016. Scalia was an ardent conservative voice on the court, and Garland was a relatively moderate choice who had garnered the praise of Republicans in the past.

But McConnell declared that Obama, a Democrat, would not choose the next justice, saying that voters should have a say through their choice of the next president. He and Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee wrote to the White House that they wouldn’t take up Obama’s nomination, and Garland never got a confirmation hearing.

The move infuriated Democrats, who argued McConnell was robbing Obama of his duty to nominate a justice. After taking office in 2017, Trump filled the seat with Neil Gorsuch. In 2020, Republicans will still control both the White House and the Senate.

This is not the first time since the 2016 battle that McConnell has entertained the possibility of filling a seat in an election year. Shortly after the confirmation of Justice Brett Kavanaugh last fall, McConnell said on “Fox New Sunday” that his resistance to confirming Garland was following the tradition of not filling a vacancy when the Senate and the presidency are controlled by different parties.

“We didn’t attack a nominee,” McConnell told Fox News’ Chris Wallace at the time.

A McConnell spokesman deferred to the Senate majority leader‘s past comments on the topic.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer spokesman Justin Goodman wrote on Twitter: “Props to the McConnell team for saying the quiet part out loud (and on the record)! They spent 3 years pretending he blocked Garland because of some kind of historical precedent. They finally admitted it's because Garland was nominated by a Democrat.“

Schumer was more succinct and pointed in his own tweet: “Senator McConnell. is a hypocrite.”

 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

So McTurtle is quickly becoming Putin's second-best bitch:

 

[fraurosena]

20 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

So McTurtle is quickly becoming Putin's second-best bitch:

 

I have to disagree with you there. I believe McConnell is Putin's very best number one bitch ever. Just look at the incredible damage he is doing to democracy right now. McConnell is the only reason Trump is still in office. Without him blocking each and every attempt by Congress to do its job, this administration would have been long gone. Heck, I don't even think Trump would have won the candidacy without him.

McConnell is the single most evil person in American politics right now. And very much in Putin's pocket.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Normally, if I receive an invitation for something I don't want to do, I say, "no thank you". In this case, I would have to say, "oh fuck no".

Some of the replies are hilarious:

Spoiler

 

[fraurosena]

Best --  or worst, depending on how you look at it -- part of the exchange:

Constituent: "Then why are you voting to repeal it? You are threatening my life."

Grassley: "Ok."

[GreyhoundFan]

Dear Rufus, please mark down this day on the calendar, because there's actually one thing that I agree with McTurtle about. "Republicans ready to quash Cuccinelli"

Spoiler

Ken Cuccinelli has spent years attacking Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans. Now, it’s time for payback.

President Donald Trump wants Cuccinelli, who most recently led the anti-establishment Senate Conservatives Fund, to be director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. But there may be nobody in Washington whom McConnell and his allies would take more pleasure in defeating, and the bottom line is Cuccinelli has little chance of getting approved for the job, Republican senators said.

“He’s spent a fair amount of his career attacking Republicans in the Senate, so it strikes me as an odd position for him to put himself in to seek Senate confirmation,” said Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, who ran the GOP’s campaign arm for two election cycles. “It’s unlikely he’s going to be confirmed if he is nominated.”

Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, the Senate GOP’s chief vote-counter, called the bid “a long shot,” adding, “They’ll go forward with it or they won’t, but I will suspect he’ll have plenty of obstacles once he gets here.”

The nascent nomination fight is again pitting the president against his own party in Congress. Just this spring, because of strong and very public opposition from Senate Republicans, Trump yanked his two preferred picks for the Federal Reserve’s board of governors before they even had been formally nominated.

And immigration has been a particular sore spot: Every leadership position at the Department of Homeland Security related to immigration is filled only by people serving in an acting capacity — and White House officials are mulling the prospect of having Cuccinelli do the same.

Some senators are still hoping to persuade Trump not to formally nominate or appoint Cuccinelli, but if the president goes through with it, the former Virginia attorney general likely will be either rejected or blocked from a floor vote entirely.

White House officials said Cuccinelli, always spoiling for a fight, is enthusiastic about another clash with McConnell. In a statement for this story, Cuccinelli showed no signs of backing down.

“My focus right now is on achieving President Trump’s immigration goals. It would certainly be my hope that senators’ primary interest is in the accomplishment of policy rather than politics,” he said.

The pushback against Trump’s attempt to install an immigration hard-liner to run the country’s legal immigration system is the climax of Senate Republicans’ yearslong battle with Cuccinelli and his organization, which has tried to oust GOP incumbents in favor of more conservative challengers. Cuccinelli joined in 2014, shortly after McConnell trounced Senate Conservatives Fund-backed opponent.

Cuccinelli also has taken aim at some of the senators needed to confirm him — calling on McConnell to resign as majority leader, backing Roy Moore in Alabama’s Senate race to the chagrin of the GOP rank and file, and criticizing the record of Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) as a “major disappointment.”

“You’re always held to what you’ve said,” Burr said when reminded of Cuccinelli’s criticisms.

Though Cuccinelli was initially slated to be the Trump administration’s immigration czar, a position the president considered creating to oversee and coordinate immigration policy, the White House changed plans in late May. And even if he never actually takes charge at USCIS, White House officials said simply being discussed for a position that requires Senate confirmation could lend additional heft to an alternative role.

Trump has occasionally floated contentious appointments to Senate Republicans — including McConnell — with no intention of nominating the individuals, according to sources familiar with his remarks. He’d then tell aides he was doing so only to make subsequent nominees seem more palatable.

Whether the president is dangling Cuccinelli’s nomination in the same spirit is unclear, but Trump officials signaled his elevation after McConnell publicly panned Cuccinelli in remarks to reporters in April.

On Tuesday, McConnell reiterated in a brief interview his strong “lack of enthusiasm” for Cuccinelli.

“It seems to me to be very difficult [to confirm him], based upon what I have read that McConnell says. I get the opinion that McConnell is not going to bring it up,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said. “So if McConnell’s not going to bring it up, it ain’t going to come up.”

Grassley predicted Cuccinelli will be temporarily installed in an acting role. If Trump wants to avoid a fight with the Senate GOP, he may seek to install Cuccinelli at USCIS in an acting capacity, according to two current and former DHS officials with knowledge of the process.

Cuccinelli’s elevation itself is a blow to Grassley, whose former staffer Francis Cissna was ousted from USCIS despite Grassley’s pleas to keep him amid Trump’s broader purge of the Department of Homeland Security.

Grassley said Cissna was “trying to do everything Trump wants done but doing it in a lawful way. It seems to me we’re a government based on the rule of law. You ought to respect people who are trying to abide by it.”

USCIS, which oversees the country’s immigration and naturalization system, is led by acting Director Mark Koumans, who took the helm this month after Cissna was pushed out. The possibility that Cuccinelli could serve a long period of time as an acting official wouldn’t be unprecedented. Thomas Homan — a former ICE official — led that agency for a year and a half.

The Cuccinelli nomination reflects the persistent bind Trump has faced when it comes to immigration. Senate Republicans are reluctant to confirm the sorts of people who share his views, such as Cuccinelli and Kris Kobach, a former Kansas secretary of state who was considered as a replacement for former Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen.

Trump’s preferred Federal Reserve picks, Stephen Moore and Herman Cain, were scuttled by GOP resistance. And Cuccinelli could be headed for the same buzz saw, though one Senate Republican worried “then we get Kris Kobach, who’s probably worse.

“I don’t know why the president keeps putting these people out without just making a few phone calls and saying: ‘Can you confirm this person?’” the senator said.

Yet those like Nielsen who have gained Senate approval have quickly fallen out of favor with the president and his top immigration adviser, Stephen Miller.

And not all senators share leadership’s view. Some came to the Senate after the peak of Senate Conservatives Fund’s power earlier this decade.

“It’s the president’s call,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) said. “I do worry sometimes that we’re going in a direction more where the only people that can be considered for appointments, you have to be computers or live in a cocoon or have never been active. That’s not realistic.”

Cramer was one of the leading opponents of Cain’s elevation to the Fed, which cratered in April. But he said that job is different than USCIS: “It’s not just the person but the position you consider them for.”

 

[fraurosena]

Huh. All it took was a hit to their financial fee-fees for the Repug senators to show tentative signs of revolt against their dear leader.

 

[fraurosena]

All those who were not at that hearing should be named and shamed, repug and dem alike.

 

[fraurosena]

McConnell is the single worst traitorous thing that has ever happened to America. Yes, even worse than Trump. Much, much worse. Trump would not be in the WH without him.

I could not agree more that McConnell should be expelled. But who would do it? Sadly, the Repugs hold the Senate, and it's in their best interests to keep him in office. How else could they rig the elections in their favor?

[GreyhoundFan]

As hard as it is for me to type this, I am pleasantly shocked by Ted Cruz.

 

[Destiny]

29 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

As hard as it is for me to type this, I am pleasantly shocked by Ted Cruz.

 

Holy motherforking shirtballs! Is this real life?

[GreyhoundFan]

9 minutes ago, Destiny said:

Holy motherforking shirtballs! Is this real life?

I know, right? First he teamed with AOC on legislation permanently preventing former members of Congress from lobbying, then this. I’m wondering if the pod people have taken over his body and his Twitter account.

[GreyhoundFan]

Well, at least Marsha is keeping up the repug crap:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

My word, Mitt is dumber than a box of rocks:

 

[Audrey2]

1 hour ago, GreyhoundFan said:

My word, Mitt is dumber than a box of rocks:

 

1. The Republicans are not known to be the intellectual party. Remember, they gave us George "Even a C student can be President" Bush, Donald "If it weren't for my Daddy's money I would have flunked out and been an incarcerated con man"Trump, and Mitch "All I want to do is obstruct the Democrats because I don't actually have any productive ideas" McConnell.

2. How dare you mention the FBI?! They are a bunch of partisan hacks and criminals, whose obsession is to obstruct Trump while giving Hillary, Obama, and Soros free passes? (Sarcasm)

Yep, I'm full of vinegar today!

[AmericanRose]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/senate-confirms-judge-who-attacked-roe-v-wade-called-being-transgender-a-delusion/ar-AAD7UGC?ocid=spartanntp

Senate confirmed a judge who is crazy and against Roe v Wade / LGBTQ+.

Because of course they did.

[47of74]

Fucking ugh.

Time once again to look at moving out of Iowa

[GreyhoundFan]

18 minutes ago, 47of74 said:

Time once again to look at moving out of Iowa

I can't imagine how you've been able to handle living in Ernstland / Grassleyville / Reynoldsstan.

[47of74]

I can't imagine how you've been able to handle living in Ernstland / Grassleyville / Reynoldsstan.

Me neither. It’s becoming an North Alabama style shithole around here.

[GreyhoundFan]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

I don't have words to describe how much I despise him: "McConnell says he was ‘thrilled’ to be frequently mentioned at Democratic debate"

Spoiler

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Thursday he was “thrilled” with frequent mentions of his name during the first round of the first Democratic debate as the candidates struggled with the question of how they would deal with the top Republican if they were president.

Several of the candidates said Wednesday night that it was critical for the Democrats to win back Senate control when pressed on how they would work with McConnell, who blocked President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee and has stymied House-passed legislation.

Others suggested rallying the public to force the Senate leader to cooperate with Democrats.

McConnell, who said he watched a baseball game instead of the debate, defended his resistance to Democratic legislation.

“I understand that my sin is that I’ve been stopping left-wing agenda items coming out of the House and confirming strict constructionists to the Supreme Court. If that’s my sin, I plead guilty,” McConnell said during a Capitol Hill news conference. “I was thrilled to dominate the discussion last night, and I think that was a legitimate discussion to have.”

The Senate leader was also asked what he would do if a Supreme Court seat became vacant under a newly elected Democratic president. When Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died in February of Obama’s last year in office, McConnell refused to hold a vote on Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, infuriating Democrats. McConnell insisted at the time that it wouldn’t be fair to voters to give a lifetime judicial appointment to a lame duck president. 

On Thursday, McConnell said his plan would depend on the timing of the vacancy — specifically, if it occurred in the first year of a presidential term. 

“Obviously, if you have a vacancy on the first year of a term of a president, you’re not going to fail to fill that vacancy for a very lengthy period of time — no matter what the political composition is,” he said. 

McConnell made sure to clarify that holding a vote on the Senate floor does not mean the nominee would be confirmed with haste. 

“The Constitution says the president makes these appointments, but there is no mandate for the Senate to give consent. Whether consent is given throughout our history has largely been dependent upon the politics of the time,” McConnell told reporters. 

The politics of the time, however, are still unknown. On the second night of the first presidential debate, McConnell stressed that the 2020 elections are more than just a referendum on President Trump.

When voters cast their ballots next year, McConnell said he believes they will signal to the nation whether they like the agenda put forth by the Democratic-led House.  

 

[Flossie]

12 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

I don't have words to describe how much I despise him: "McConnell says he was ‘thrilled’ to be frequently mentioned at Democratic debate"

  Hide contents

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Thursday he was “thrilled” with frequent mentions of his name during the first round of the first Democratic debate as the candidates struggled with the question of how they would deal with the top Republican if they were president.

Several of the candidates said Wednesday night that it was critical for the Democrats to win back Senate control when pressed on how they would work with McConnell, who blocked President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee and has stymied House-passed legislation.

Others suggested rallying the public to force the Senate leader to cooperate with Democrats.

McConnell, who said he watched a baseball game instead of the debate, defended his resistance to Democratic legislation.

“I understand that my sin is that I’ve been stopping left-wing agenda items coming out of the House and confirming strict constructionists to the Supreme Court. If that’s my sin, I plead guilty,” McConnell said during a Capitol Hill news conference. “I was thrilled to dominate the discussion last night, and I think that was a legitimate discussion to have.”

The Senate leader was also asked what he would do if a Supreme Court seat became vacant under a newly elected Democratic president. When Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia died in February of Obama’s last year in office, McConnell refused to hold a vote on Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland, infuriating Democrats. McConnell insisted at the time that it wouldn’t be fair to voters to give a lifetime judicial appointment to a lame duck president. 

On Thursday, McConnell said his plan would depend on the timing of the vacancy — specifically, if it occurred in the first year of a presidential term. 

“Obviously, if you have a vacancy on the first year of a term of a president, you’re not going to fail to fill that vacancy for a very lengthy period of time — no matter what the political composition is,” he said. 

McConnell made sure to clarify that holding a vote on the Senate floor does not mean the nominee would be confirmed with haste. 

“The Constitution says the president makes these appointments, but there is no mandate for the Senate to give consent. Whether consent is given throughout our history has largely been dependent upon the politics of the time,” McConnell told reporters. 

The politics of the time, however, are still unknown. On the second night of the first presidential debate, McConnell stressed that the 2020 elections are more than just a referendum on President Trump.

When voters cast their ballots next year, McConnell said he believes they will signal to the nation whether they like the agenda put forth by the Democratic-led House.  

"When voters cast their ballots next year, McConnell said he believes they will signal to the nation whether they like the agenda put forth by the Democratic-led House."

And if he doesn't like how the voters vote, he'll just ignore them and gleefully do his best to go around them.

 

[fraurosena]

Fuck. America is as good as going to war with Iran.

 

[AmericanRose]

Didn't people say they didn't want to vote for Hillary because she's a warmonger...?