Photo by Vlad Tchompalov on Unsplash
The tragic death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has put Trump’s four-year War on Women—and the GOP’s rank hypocrisy—back in focus just weeks before Election Day.
Even before we had time to process the headlines about RBG’s death, Senate Majority Leader Mitch “The Grim Reaper” McConnell announced he would abandon the “Merrick Garland Rule” and, in the midst of an economy-destroying pandemic, set aside all other Senate business to rush the confirmation process for any Trump nominee.
Trump’s gleeful announcement that he would nominate “Handmaid” Amy Coney Barrett to take RBG’s place turned into a White House “Super Spreader” event of its own. Quite possibly, this was the event that infected Trump himself with COVID-19.
For added irony, Trump is now bragging about—and promoting—a Covid “cure” that itself was developed using aborted fetal tissue. Trump now wants to give this made-possible-by-abortion cure to every American (including every anti-choice Evangelical) who needs it.
To make sense of it all—and to truly understand the stakes ahead for all women and men who care about reproductive freedom, healthcare and the future—I turned to lawyer and author Amee Vanderpool, Twitter’s @girlsreallyrule, and the editor of the incredibly popular SHERO newsletter here on Substack.
Q&A with SHERO’s Amee Vanderpool
What did RBG represent to you personally and to the country?
This is such a difficult question for me to answer because Justice Ginsburg had such an effect on me both personally and professionally. I remember reading her Supreme Court rulings in law school for the first time and feeling such relief that someone had finally gotten it—I felt seen for the first time. This is such a rare thing for a younger woman in the legal profession, even today. She gave me a confidence early on to keep my head up and to keep speaking my mind. As I got older and learned more about her life and work, her lessons seemed to keep guiding how I approached difficult decisions on a professional and personal level. This is just another reason why her death was so difficult because I felt, as many did, that I knew her. So, I waited a few days to gather my thoughts and emotions and then tried to put it all down in a farewell article in Shero. You can read it here: What Happened Was...We Lost a Legend.
What are your biggest fears about seeing a 6-3 conservative majority in the court?
I just got a lump in my throat reading this question. I have so many issues with this proposition, that condensing it into a few will be hard, but I will pick the most detrimental aspects and talk about those. The biggest, initial impact we will feel as a country will be the reversal of decades of Civil Rights advancements. Think about how the Voting Rights Act was recently gutted and all of the work we have had to do to compensate and imagine that tenfold and for the next 50 years. People who believe in a more progressive social agenda, which is the majority of America, will be on the defensive for the rest of their lives. The right to a safe and legal abortion will be chipped away on a case by case basis as the Court begins to uphold extreme restrictions put into place by states, which means poorer women in Conservative states will bear the burden and will be forced into unsafe situations that we can liken to a “back alley abortion.” Think about everything the Republican platform has represented for the last forty years and then just put that into effect, with no guard rails and no opposition to stop it.
Trump’s recent appointees are fairly young and expected to live a live a long time. Without a change in the number of Justices who preside via a Constitutional Amendment, this majority will likely be locked in place for the next 3-4 generations of Americans. Trump has also added a record number of judges, with lifetime appointments, to the appellate level courts - added Amy Coney Barrett in 2017 to the Seventh Circuit District Court. These intermediate level courts are critical for making case law that establishes which cases are heard by the Supreme Court and how those cases pass through the system. This is not just a case of SCOTUS being rigged, but our entire federal system.
We have seen how scary our system of government becomes when the Executive Branch is compromised and has the support of half of the Legislative Branch. Luckily, Democrats regained control of the House of Representatives in the 2018 Midterm Elections, but this has only allowed us to play defense, not to correct or make any helpful laws. The Courts have been the single most important ally in safeguarding the integrity of this country and have ruled against the Trump administration more than any other time. If the Judicial Branch is ultimately compromised by Trump’s extensive appointee list, the impact will be monumental and lasting.
Let’s imagine this turns out to be another “Blue Wave” election. Would you support President Biden and a Democratic-controlled Senate restoring the will of the people by expanding the Court to 13 Justices in the next 4 years?
Initially, I was hesitant about this option, thanks to the lessons we have now learned from Harry Reid eliminating the super majority. That one win for Democrats has turned into several huge and incomparable losses now that Mitch McConnell has the key to Pandora’s Box and can move on anything he likes because the voting threshold has been lowered. What might seem like a win in this moment, could be catastrophic in the future if Republicans take control of those four new seats. I think the best way to fix the entire system is to allow for more judges in the Constitution, but to make several more seats available, upwards of 23 or so. If the number of Justices remains high, then the pendulum swing of politics will be insulated by the number of sitting judges and a distribution of cases that is likely to be more fair. We should also be assigning court cases to 7 or so at a time, on rotation and shuffling Justices around to ensure impartiality. This way the Court can also hear and rule on more cases. A Constitutional Amendment is a very difficult thing to achieve, and it would require a strong Democratic majority in both the House and the Senate as well as the White House.
(interview continues below)
Even before RBG’s death, you’ve been stressing for months the importance of taking back the Senate. Beyond the Supreme Court, what would you hope to see President Biden and a Democratic-led Senate achieve in the next 4 years?
Universal Healthcare that protects every single American is the number one, most critical thing we need to immediately accomplish. I would love to see us move toward the ideals set out in the Green New Deal, as well. There are going to be many laws that need to be put in place, now that Trump has shown us where several of the weak links are in our system of government. The potential for real change, the kind that changes people’s lives, seems limitless.
There’s less than a month until the Election. What can individuals do to most effectively support Democratic candidates and get out the vote between now and November 3rd?
Think of it like that airplane emergency message: first, you want to secure yourself, and then assist those around you. Make sure that you check your own voter registration status at www.iwillvote.com and then make your voting plan. If you have mail-in voting in your state, make sure you are dropping your ballot off early and at a secure location, such as an election office or a designated drop box. Only mail in your ballot as a last resort due to the slow delivery rates we are still managing. If you can vote in person, make sure that you are as protected as you can be and be prepared to stay for the day and have a picnic. Many polling locations have been shuttered and access will be more limited, so be prepared. Check in with every Democratic voter you know and remind them of this as well. I recommend that in terms of donations, you pick a few candidates in other states who are running viable Senate campaigns to sponsor. You can also contact a campaign directly to volunteer to help, even if you are in another state. If you are most concerned about voter turnout, volunteer with a group who works on that issue such as Swing Left, Rock the Vote, or the League of Women Voters. If you want to be involved on election day, consider volunteering at the polls with groups like The Poll Hero Project or Power the Polls. Find what interests you and put your time there, while making sure to keep your donations going, even if they are very small amounts.
What is your best-case/worst-case scenario for America starting November 4th?
I’m going to focus on the best case until I have to deal with the worst case. If we can vote for Biden in such huge numbers that his victory is declared on election night, that is really our best chance for stopping Trump from gaining traction with his false claims of fraud. If the voters are clear, the courts will move swiftly and it will be hard for him to argue something was stolen from him if the race is not even close. This gives us two months to facilitate moving him out of the Oval Office. Then we can start to charge him with all of the crimes he has been shielded from for the last four years at both the state and federal level, so that a pardon won’t even factor into it. I want to keep this daydream as loose as possibly, so that I’m not tempting fate and so we have lots of room to maneuver, because Trump will inevitably make the process very difficult.
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