This is the most important — and consequential — election in our lifetime.
Today, Senate Republicans, who represent less than half of the population, are forcing through the lifetime appointment of a Supreme Court justice chosen by a president who lost the popular vote — and they are justifying this move using the exact opposite logic they used to previously steal another seat for that same president. A president whose administration currently has cases scheduled to be heard by the Court within the coming weeks.
The gall and callousness displayed by the Senate Republicans is striking mostly in that it isn’t surprising at all — despite declarations in 2016 and 2018 that they wouldn’t support any Supreme Court nominees in an election year (the reasoning used to deny President Obama’s pick for Justice Scalia’s seat, Merrick Garland, so much as a hearing), the fact that Mitch McConnell announced his intent to seat a replacement for Justice Ginsburg roughly two hours after her death and just over a month away from an election in which people had already started voting was exactly aligned with what we have come to expect from the Senate majority. Their shameless actions to hold on to power are so normalized, it almost feels like a waste of energy to get angry. We are looking at a group of people secure in the knowledge that the system currently supports them, and that as long as they work to maintain that system, they’re untouchable.
But that’s also where they’re wrong — they’re only untouchable if we allow them to be. If we sit out elections, skip town halls, let someone else make the decisions. If we sigh every time we see a news headline, scream on social media (or in a Medium post. . .), and then go about our day. But we can’t do that — we can’t be complacent, or just accept this as inevitable. We have to take action.
This is about our lives, our welfare, and our democracy.
It’s about the Affordable Care Act, which the current administration is suing to end during a pandemic
It’s about Roe v. Wade, which allows millions of women to control their own bodies and economic destiny.
It’s about voting rights, which are being challenged in legislatures and courthouses across the nation.
It’s about LGBTQIA+ rights, which are openly being challenged by this administration and members of the Court.
It’s about all of this and so, so much more.
So what can we do? We can vote.
We have eight (8!) days to send a clear message — not just about this president, but about Congress, and our values as a nation. We can elect a president, Senators, and Representatives who represent *us* and leverage that to ensure a government that reflects us all — by expanding the courts to counter the damage wrought by justices seated through processes like the one we’re seeing today, by using Census data to draw more equitable and representative district lines, by giving an official voice to the nearly 4 million Americans living without Congressional representation (in DC, Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands and American Samoa), by eliminating the racist and inequitable Electoral College system.
We always hear that this is “the most important election of our lifetime.” And while that’s certainly true, I want to instead remind you all that this is the most *consequential* election as well — this election is going to set the course of our entire nation for at least a generation. It’s going to determine not only what our future will be, but whether we’ll even have one, since Climate Action is on the ballot. It’s going to determine whether our lives and finances will weather this pandemic, and the long-term physical and economic damage. It’s going to determine whether women, people of color, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, religious minorities, and others have the right to self-determination and equality in the eyes of the law. It’s going to determine the role we play in the international community.
Don’t let someone else, let alone a group who believes itself unbeholden to the people, make that decision for you.