Less than two days after the death of US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg battle lines are hardening over the appointment of her successor. President Trump declared yesterday. He was determined to fill her vacant seat “without delay,” and said that he would choose a woman. Justice Ginsburg had said that her “most fervent wish” was that she not be replaced before a new president took office. Already there have been two Republican senators who have said they would not vote for a new nominee before this year’s election—Collins in Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska who are both facing tough re-election campaigns.
Democrats raised more than $71 million in the hours after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, demonstrating how the liberal icon’s passing and the contentious nomination fight that lies ahead have already galvanized the party’s base.
The huge sum was raised by 9 p.m. Saturday after news of her death broke late Friday, according to a donation ticker on the website of ActBlue, the party’s online fundraising platform.
The 2020 campaign, which will decide control of the White House and the Senate, had already delivered record-shattering fundraising totals for the Democrats, a sign of the motivation within the party to rebuke President Donald Trump on Election Day.
But Ginsburg’s death brought new impetus to the campaign, particularly after Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., both pledged to move forward with finding a new justice.
That would further tilt the court in a conservative direction, carrying wide-ranging implications for the fate of abortion access, environmental regulations and health care.
Cable news media have been repeatedly replaying clips by Republican Senator Lindsay Graham from 2016, when Republicans blocked an effort by Barack Obama to replace supreme court justice Antonin Scalia who died in February of 2016. Republicans then argued that such appointments should not be made in an election year.
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