Blumenthal: Trump’s a ‘Puppet’ of The Federalist Society and Heritage

‘He is not the right nominee; right wing, fringe, the product of a corrupt process and a president who has made himself puppet of these groups’

RUSH EXCERPT:

MELBER: "Panel, hang with me. I want to bring in democratic senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut who serves on the Judiciary Committee. Senator, you’ve been listening to this debate here. On behalf of the panel we have talented lawyers but if you ever watch “Sesame street” and they say one of these things is different than all the others, you have a vote, none of us do. Walk us through how to block this vote if that’s your goal."
BLUMENTHAL: "I’m privileged to join this highly talented team of lawyers. I was a law clerk on the united States Supreme Court for Harry Blackman the year after he wrote the majority opinion in roe V. Wade. I’ve argued cases before the United States Supreme Court, four of them. I really regard this institution with reverence as well as respect and what Donald Trump is doing — talk about partisan — is outsourcing and delegating this decision to right wing fringe groups that are implementing screening and vetting this nominee for the trump litmus test, automatically overturn Roe v. Wade, cut back health care rights, civil rights, voting rights, this will be shaped for decades. What are we doing to stop this nomination? Well, of course, first, like good lawyers on the judiciary Committee we’re doing a ton of research and what we have discovered is this nominee is in favor of giving the president power to fire the special counsel who is investigating him. That he is in favor of vast expansion of presidential power when most Americans today want Donald Trump to be checked and bridled because he’s out of control. Personally as well as in terms of authority and he has favored holding the consumer finance protection board unconstitutional. He doesn’t like what it does, protecting consumers but he thinks the president ought to have control over it. So these kinds of knowledge and facts are relevant and we’ll make the case to the American people that he is not the right nominee, right wing, fringe, the product of a corrupt process and a president who has made himself puppet of these groups. And look how relevant this is is right now. Rudy Giuliani said the president ought to continue to have pardon power. Who will determine that? The swing vote. Who will determine whether he has to comply with a subpoena from the special counsel? This nominee. And he absolutely must recuse himself. That is a bare minimum that my colleagues should insist on him doing."

Video files
Full
Compact
Audio files
Full
Compact