#why are Leo and Antonin the Worst.

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The list won Trump the White House. Now Democrats are using it against him.

https://uniteddemocrats.net/?p=5113

The list won Trump the White House. Now Democrats are using it against him.

It’s the list that won him the presidency.

President Donald Trump’s widely publicized list of potential Supreme Court nominees brought conservative doubters — including evangelicals — to the highly unconventional Republican nominee’s side. It prevented them from fleeing as the “Access Hollywood” tape threatened to tank Trump’s campaign. And it reassured them throughout Trump’s turbulent presidency, especially when he pulled from it to ensure Justice Neil Gorsuch’s smooth ascent to the high court.

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Now, it’s warding off the chaos that grips other facets of Trump’s administration as he weighs another Supreme Court nominee.

Within moments of Justice Anthony Kennedy announcing his retirement, Trump told reporters he’d be picking his replacement from the list, sending a clear signal that the often-rogue president understands how he can’t risk alienating the conservative base heading first into midterms and then his own reelection bid.

But this time around, the list has become a liability, too, as swing-vote Republicans urge Trump to think bigger and Democrats use it to get a running start in their campaign against Trump’s forthcoming pick.

Still, the White House believes the defined universe of names makes the posturing around who will ultimately be selected less dramatic, Republicans involved in the decision-making said. And because the more than two dozen names on the list are cut from the same cloth as Gorsuch, they argue, endangered Democrats who backed Gorsuch will find it difficult to vote against another candidate from the list.

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“People have to understand that this is the most transparent judicial selection process we’ve ever had,” said Leonard Leo, an outside adviser to the president and an architect of the list itself, which was first released in mid-2016. “The president’s driving the process.”

The list has focused media coverage on potential choices and reinforced the theme that Trump is looking at qualified individuals with proven records that are right of center, said Ron Bonjean, who handled White House communications during the Gorsuch confirmation.

“Doing this sends a direct message to conservatives and outside groups in order to stoke enthusiasm that the president is considering judicial nominees that are right up their alley,” Bonjean said. “As Trump shortens the list, it creates a buildup of news coverage and suspense about who will be the final choice.”

Yet as Trump faces a self-imposed July 9 deadline to name Kennedy’s replacement, critics are using the president’s transparency against him. They’re digging through old cases and already producing ads targeting potential nominees, fearful that the next justice could tip the balance on abortion rights, affirmative action and a host of other hot-button issues.

“The list has given his opponents a head start,” said Brian Fallon, executive director of Demand Justice, a new group that plans to spend $5 million opposing Trump’s pick. “We’ve gone through all the public records. We’ve read their cases, we’ve watched all the video footage of all the public speeches.”

Democratic Sens. Kamala Harris of California, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and Jeff Merkley of Oregon have already promoted the #ditchthelist hashtag on Twitter, with Harris dismissing the individuals on Trump’s list as “complete non-starters.”

“The American people deserve a Supreme Court justice who will fight to protect their rights, not conservative ideologues,” she wrote on Twitter.

Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, two pro-abortion rights Republican votes Trump will need to get any nominee confirmed, have joined the call to ditch the list as the public debates over abortion and guns grow louder.

Collins has reservations about several people on the list and has voted against at least one of them, William Pryor of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, who once called the landmark abortion rights case Roe v. Wade “the worst abomination of constitutional law in our history.”

In a meeting at the White House last week, Collins and Murkowski asked Trump to consider adding names to the list.

“I think the president should not feel bound by that list and instead should seek out recommendations to ensure that he gets the best possible person,” Collins said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.”

All presidential administrations maintain Supreme Court shortlists, but Trump’s public release was unique, said Ronald Weich, who served in President Barack Obama’s Justice Department and worked on the nominations of Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Before joining the Obama administration, he worked as counsel to Senate Democrats to oppose George W. Bush’s nominations of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito.

“The fact that his list is very public makes the stakes clear for everybody,” said Weich, now dean of the University of Baltimore School of Law. “We have a clear sense of the kind of nominee this president plans to nominate, and that gives everyone time in advance to analyze their writings and opinions.”

That’s exactly what Democrats are doing. A coalition of progressive groups organized under the Demand Justice banner has launched a ditch-the-list campaign urging Trump to choose a “consensus moderate.” If Trump doesn’t, the left is ready.

“We can run a pretty standardized opposition against whoever he picks. They all belong to the same club,” Fallon said.

As the left takes aim at the list, some would-be candidates, such as Pryor, will be easier to tarnish. Trump could call the Democrats’ bluff by choosing someone who has a scant record on sharply divisive issues such as abortion or guns. And if Trump does ditch the list, he’s not likely to abandon the judicial mindset it represents.

“If by some chance he did go off the list, I have no doubt he would pick somebody who probably should’ve been on the list to begin with,” said John Malcolm, vice president of the Institute for Constitutional Government at The Heritage Foundation and another architect of the list.

“They’re just going to throw whatever mud on the wall they can dig up,” he said of Democrats. “It’s a great list, and I see no reason for the president to deviate from that list.”

The list was born in May 2016 as a political tool. Even though he had secured enough delegates to win the Republican nomination, Trump had yet to win over skeptical establishment leaders and remained a long-shot candidate. Dubious about his conservative bona fides, grass-roots activists were plotting to stop him at the party’s national convention in July.

At the time, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was refusing to consider President Barack Obama’s nominee to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

The original list, with 11 names, acknowledged that Trump was listening. And it came with a promise he would use the list “as a guide to nominate our next United States Supreme Court Justices.”

That was enough to persuade conservatives to trust Trump to follow through on his word, said Carrie Severino, chief counsel at Judicial Crisis Network.

“This issue is really what gave Donald Trump the presidency,” Severino said.

By the end of July, Trump had won the nomination and was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, campaigning with his list.

“If you really like Donald Trump, that’s great, but if you don’t, you have to vote for me anyway. You know why? Supreme Court judges,” Trump told the crowd. “Have no choice. Sorry, sorry, sorry.”

For all its benefits, the list itself can’t prevent surprise outcomes.

Justice Clarence Thomas’ nomination was rocked by explosive testimony from Anita Hill about sexual harassment she allegedly endured from Thomas. Douglas Ginsburg asked the president to withdraw his name after admitting to marijuana use. And President Lyndon Johnson’s appointment of Abe Fortas to succeed Chief Justice Earl Warren was stymied.

Weich cautioned not to put too much stock in the smooth nature of the Gorsuch confirmation process.

“He had one successful disciplined nomination the first time,” he said. “Let’s see how it goes this time.”

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