We cannot accept a Supreme Court Justice who will dismantle our hard won rights — from health care and reproductive justice, civil rights, voting rights, women’s right’s, marriage equality, police brutality and mass incarceration.

The younger you are, the more marginalized your identity, the more that’s at stake, because Supreme Court justices serve a lifetime and, as the name suggests, are the supreme deciders of the law of the land.

Will we allow the Senate to confirm a justice who will assuredly share the views of 45’s Christian fundamentalist base, rich supporters, and endorsers, such as, the National Fraternal Order of Police, the Border Patrol Union, the National Rifle Association and the Ku Klux Klan?

Or, will we stand up fight back and show up at the polls November 6 as if our lives depend on it?

We must delay the confirmation until after January 2019, when a new Congress will be sworn in. And we must ensure that that Congress is more progressive than this one.

Justice Kennedy’s successor is particularly important because while, for the most part, Justice Kennedy is conservative, his was the deciding vote on many decisions that established rights for marginalized people.

45’s strongest lever to prove to his supporters he will “make America great again” is to replace Justice Kennedy with someone who will roll back every right our forebears sacrificed so much to win.

45 will do everything in his power to get the confirmation done to inspire his base to turn out at the midterms on November 6, to reward and punish Senators based on how they vote on the confirmation.

Supreme Court nominees require Senate confirmation. Republicans hold the majority in the US Senate, 51 to 49. Senator McCain will likely be unable to vote because he is ill. Republican Senator Susan Collins from Maine and Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski from Alaska hold socially liberal views. And there are Democrat Senators who represent Republican states who will feel intense pressure to vote to confirm the nominee.

What can you and I do?

Gather together with our likeminded friends and organize.
Call, write, email, Instagram, tweet and urge our families and friends to do the same. Let’s make #WeOppose(NameOfNominee) trend EVERYDAY for four months!
Register to vote and get your friends and family registered too! Research who your representative is — all 435 seats in the House of Representatives are up for grabs in the midterm election. Is your Senator up for reelection? Is he or she opposed to confirming the nominee? And, if so, how specifically is he or she opposing? Tag your elected officials on pics #WeAreRegisteredAndWatchingYou
Protest and engage in civil disobedience.

On the Fourth of July, Therese Patricia Okoumou captured all of our imaginations by magically scaling the Statue of Liberty to demand children be released. Last week, I was one of 630 women arrested at the US Senate to protest family separation.

We can and must put our bodies at risk to stop this process. Too much is on the line.

KarenFleshman

Writing since July 2018 · 1 story contributed