The Saucer That Cools The Tea Is Cracked

Created
Fri, 01/12/2023 - 11:30
Updated
Fri, 01/12/2023 - 11:30
It looks like the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee have decided to reprise their dignified behavior in the Kavanaugh hearings. Whenever something threatens the big bubble they’ve created around their precious Supreme Court majority they turn into shrieking harpies: Tempers exploded at a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting Thursday before Democrats voted to subpoena a major conservative donor and a prominent conservative activist linked to the Supreme Court’s ethics scandals.  The Republican members of the committee stormed out of the hearing room in the Hart Building shortly before Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) called a vote on authorizing the subpoenas.  The motion passed with 11 Democratic votes. Not a single Republican was left in the room by the time the roll call ended.   Durbin went ahead with the vote shortly before noon to prevent Republicans from delaying it until next week by invoking a rule to limit committee meetings to two hours.   The meeting came after weeks of partisan fighting among members of the Judiciary Committee over plans to subpoena conservative donor Harlan Crow and activist Leonard Leo, the co-chairman of the Federalist Society, in response to reporting by ProPublica that revealed the two men played roles in taking conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito on luxury vacations.  The latest in politics and policy. Direct to your inbox. Sign up for the News Alerts newsletterSubscribe Durbin and federal courts subcommittee Chair Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) advanced the subpoenas after Crow and Leo refused to cooperate with their investigation into Supreme Court ethics. …