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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSchumer, Democrats wrestled over staging mass Kavanaugh walkout
I wish they had.
Schumer, Democrats wrestled over staging mass Kavanaugh walkout
The party decided that a made-for-TV moment could backfire, and instead opted for a strategy of maximum disruption.
By BURGESS EVERETT and ELANA SCHOR
09/04/2018 07:40 PM EDT
Updated 09/04/2018 07:59 PM EDT
Hours before Brett Kavanaugh arrived for his Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday, Chuck Schumer and frustrated fellow Democratic senators debated staging a mass walkout or not showing up at all.
For weeks, the party grappled with how to force the release of millions of pages of missing Kavanaugh documents after Republicans spurned their previous attempts. The discussions culminated during a Labor Day conference call: Senators weighed the drastic protest measures but opted against them, worried about what would come next and whether the fallout from a made-for-TV moment would undercut their efforts to defeat the nomination, according to multiple Democratic sources.
The strategy session revealed a divide on the Judiciary Committee between its more aggressive, often younger senators and veterans who prefer to adhere to the chambers norms. To bridge that gap, Democrats settled on a middle ground: disruption.
They created a spectacle by hijacking the hearing as soon as it started and calling for the committee to adjourn against a backdrop of liberal activists being arrested in protest. At the same time, opposition lawmakers left themselves room to grill Kavanaugh in the coming days by remaining active participants in the high court hearings.
The compromise still injected a dose of drama in an otherwise rote day of partisan opening statements.
more...
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/09/04/kavanaugh-democrats-supreme-court-hearing-806567
C_U_L8R
(45,014 posts)It may be a given that this creep will be nominated but we don't have to make it easy. There is too much dirt in this guy's past to let him breeze through uncontested.
MichMary
(1,714 posts)C_U_L8R
(45,014 posts)Posting before coffee.
NewJeffCT
(56,828 posts)I think it helped that passionate Dems like Booker, Harris, Blumenthal, Durbin, etc made some great points attacking Kavanaugh.
If they had walked out, the hearing still would have been televised and would have consisted of the Republicans on the committee fellating Kavanaugh in public with softball questions that he could tee up and knock out of the park. Then, Democrats would have been criticized for not showing up and asking the tough questions.
MichMary
(1,714 posts)I've been following some of the rw nutjob sites, and what we see as valiant, legitimate efforts to stop a bad nominee, they see as grandstanding.
At this point, it's all about playing to the base for the midtems--on both sides. Our side is already fired up and motivated to vote. The last thing we should want is to fire up THEIR base. You can bet the Rs will use the protests, etc. to tell their base, "See? This is why we need more Senators."