Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) eviscerated the main conservative argument against filling Antonin Scalia’s Supreme Court seat during President Barack Obama’s last year in office.
Warren, an acclaimed legal scholar, explained in a viral Facebook post that since the American people re-elected Obama in 2012, his power to nominate a replacement has already been approved by the voters.
Warren referred to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Ky.) claim that it would be undemocratic to seat an Obama nominee in the president’s last year. McConnell "is right that the American people should have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court justice,” Warren wrote. “In fact, they did -- when President Obama won the 2012 election by five million votes.”
The clause in the constitution empowering the president to name Supreme Court justices -- Article II, Section 2 -- does not include an exception for when the president only has one year left in office, Warren noted.
Of course, McConnell himself has acknowledged as much in the past, since he voted to confirm Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy in 1988, the last year of Reagan’s presidency.
Warren’s post had been shared more than 75,000 times as of noon on Sunday.
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