By Robert
Reich
Don’t get caught up in the predictable brawl over Neil Gorsuch’s
credentials or his ideology. That normalizes the Trump presidency.
Instead,
there should be no vote on Gorsuch’s nomination until Trump’s legitimacy as a president is
established.
Which
means the Senate intelligence committee and F.B.I. must first conclude that
Russian operatives were not responsible for Trump’s electoral victory, Trump
must reveal his taxes, and he must put his assets into a blind trust.
Mitch
McConnell wouldn’t even permit a vote on Obama’s pick, Merrick Garland, on the
ground that Obama’s term would end in 10 months.
Here, we have a president whose term itself may not be
legitimate.
A Supreme Court pick is the most important nomination a president can make, affecting how the Constitution and laws are interpreted, and potentially affecting generations to come.
There should be no cloud over the legitimacy of the president
who makes such a pick.
Democrats
and courageous Republicans must not produce the 60 vote quorum needed to
overcome a filibuster.
When and if this strategy no longer works, it is imperative that
senators continue to vote against consent orders to proceed with the nomination
– until and unless Trump’s legitimacy is established.
Trump
is the issue here, as well as the integrity of our democracy.
ROBERT B. REICH is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at
the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center
for Developing Economies. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton
administration, for which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective
cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century. He has written fourteen books,
including the best sellers "Aftershock", "The Work of Nations,"
and "Beyond Outrage," and, his most recent, "Saving
Capitalism." He is also a founding editor of the American Prospect
magazine, chairman of Common Cause, a member of the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences, and co-creator of the award-winning documentary, INEQUALITY FOR
ALL.
