GOP wins Supreme Court fight but the battle has just begun

Workers prepare for a memorial service for Ruth Bader Ginsburg at the US Supreme Court. Picture: AFP.

Donald Trump will now almost certainly be able to go to the election boasting that he has appointed three conservative justices to the Supreme Court in a single term.

That is a record which will go a long way to shoring up and even enlarging his support among his conservative base, including evangelicals.

Despite the smoke and fury of the Democrats, their campaign to prevent the nomination of a replacement for the late liberal justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before the election has quickly faltered as Senator Mitt Romney said he would vote to confirm a new judge to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before the November poll.

In the end, the Republicans have the numbers in the Senate and the Democrats don’t. Simple as that. Joe Biden and Democrat leaders have pleaded with Republicans to search their “conscience” and refuse to confirm a new justice so close to the election, given that Republicans initially used this excuse to block Barack Obama’s nominee in 2016.

But only two Republican Senators, moderates Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, will side with the Democrats. For Republicans – as it would be for the Democrats – the prize of an extra ideological ally on the nation’s highest court is irresistible.

There are still some fireworks to come. The confirmation hearing for whoever Trump’s new nominee is will be feisty, especially with Biden’s running mate and former prosecutor Kamala Harris on the Judiciary Committee.

US Republican Senator Mitt Romney has said he would support moving forward to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court before the presidential election. Picture: AFP.

While the Democrats will not be able to block the appointment, their tactic is to launch a scare campaign to warn liberal voters of what this new 6-3 conservative majority will mean for touchstone issues like abortion rights and healthcare.

Their hope is that this will energise more liberals to get out and vote for Biden, thereby ending Trump’s presidency and preventing any further conservative appointments to the nine-member court.

The Democrats will argue that with a 6-3 conservative majority, there may be little to prevent the Supreme Court moving to dismantle the landmark 1973 Roe v Wade ruling affirming a woman’s legal right to an abortion.

This warning will resonate more loudly if Trump picks the reported frontrunner for the vacant seat, Judge Amy Barrett, a devout Catholic who is considered hostile to abortion rights.

The other alarm which Democrats are sounding to their own voters is the threat which a 6-3 court will pose to their beloved Affordable Care Act, dubbed Obamacare.

The court is due to consider a legal challenge to the ACA a week after the November election and without Ginsburg, a reliable defender of the ACA, Democrats warn that the court could strike down the ACA leaving some 20 million Americans without insurance.

So while there is little the Democrats can do to prevent the appointment of a new justice, they will use it to energise their base to put Biden in the White House.

Of course, Republicans will also use the lure of the conservative court to energise their base. They will say Trump should be reward for a second term because his three appointments will deliver conservative rulings for a generation on issues such as gun rights, abortion laws, criminal justice, immigration and religion.

The political battle to install – or prevent – a replacement for Ginsburg appears to be over bar the shouting. But the battle to use these extraordinary circumstances to milk votes for both Trump and Biden has only just begun.

(Cameron Stewart is also US Contributor for Sky News Australia)