Jayapal on the Confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett

SEATTLE — United States Representative Pramila Jayapal (WA-07), Co-Chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and member of the House Judiciary Committee, issued the following statement on the Senate’s confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court of the United States:

“The injustice this country witnessed over the last 30 days will be remembered in history as exactly what it was: a disgraceful Republican power grab to use an illegitimate, rushed, hypocritical process to confirm a nominee whose dangerous views have not been thoroughly or fairly vetted to the highest court in our land just days before a Presidential election in which more than 60 million Americans have already voted.

“It is absolutely unacceptable that a nominee for a lifetime appointment who has such troubling positions on life-and-death issues would be rushed through, especially after Republicans outright refused to allow even a vote for Merrick Garland when he was nominated more than seven months before an election.

“If Donald Trump and his Republicans think that breaking with precedent and ramming through a right-wing nominee will silence our voices, slow our movement for justice and stop our march for equality, they are mistaken. They could not be more wrong. We are only going to grow stronger and redouble our efforts to protect and expand our rights.

“We will fight even harder to guarantee health care as a human right and to stop Republicans’ deadly effort to take health care away from millions of families at a time when more than 87 million people are already uninsured or underinsured during a pandemic. We will fight even harder to expand voting rights and civil rights as we see voter suppression across America and equality under assault. We will fight even harder to defend reproductive rights as states continue attacking our constitutional right to make our own choices about our bodies. We will fight even harder for the rights of workers as they are too often called essential but treated as expendable. And we will fight even harder to protect immigrant rights, disability rights, LGBTQ+ rights and Indigenous rights as Republicans try to undermine them at every single turn. 

“We will never forget this illegitimate confirmation process and shameless power grab by Republicans, but I guarantee you that they will never forget how the people responded to it with the future of our country at stake.”

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Issues: Government Reform & Ethics