Donald Trump is set to inherit an uncommon number of vacancies in the federal courts in addition to the open Supreme Court seat, giving the president-elect a monumental opportunity to reshape the judiciary after taking office.
The estimated 103 judicial vacancies that President Obama is expected to hand over to Trump in the Jan. 20 transition of power is nearly double the 54 openings Obama found eight years ago following George W. Bush’s presidency. [snip]
The result is a multitude of openings throughout the federal circuit and district courts that will allow the new Republican president to quickly make a wide array of lifetime appointments.
State gun control laws, abortion restrictions, voter laws, anti-discrimination measures and immigrant issues are all matters that are increasingly heard by federal judges and will be influenced by the new composition of the courts. Trump has vowed to choose ideologues in the mold of the late Supreme Court justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative icon — a prospect that has activists on the right giddy. (our emphasis)With the Senate in control of far- right Republicans under Machiavellian sleazeball Sen. Mitch "Missy" McConnell (Testudines- KY), there won't be anything long standing in the way before those "giddy" fascists see their own installed on courts across the nation. Clearly, Republican obstructionism has paid off: 8 years of delaying, slow- walking and denying the winner (by large margins) of the 2008 and 2012 elections the Constitutional right to appoint Federal judges has paid off handsomely for these party- before- country cynics. Most egregious was the year- long blocking of Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court, who instead will be replaced with a Scalia- clone appointee by neo- fascist reactionary Donald "Rump" Trump, making this all particularly difficult to swallow.
This illustrates one of the most important lessons Democrats need to learn and incorporate in their political DNA: we need to act like politics is a zero sum game, just as Republicans do. No more bringing knives to a gunfight.
