UPDATE: The White House has pulled its nomination of this abomination! Thanks for your calls and emails!
- Action #1: Tell your senators that voting for Chad Meredith, or ANY FEDERALIST SOCIETY MEMBER, is a racist and anti-democratic action. AND START FILLING THOSE VACANCIES!
- Action #2: Call Biden.
- Action #3: Write Biden.
By now, Biden is probably rethinking nominating Stephen Chad Meredith to a lifetime seat on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky. Chad is a Republican forced-birther whose career has included defending abortion restrictions, participating in a pardoning scandal for the outgoing Republican governor, and working to limit the incoming Democratic governor’s executive authority. He is also a Federalist Society member, just like the six SCOTUS members who killed Roe, unleashed guns, crumbled the wall between church and state, disempowered the EPA, and degraded Native American rights.
As there’s no seat currently available for Chad, it’s clear that this is part of some larger deal on judicial nominations between the President and Mitch McConnell,” Rep. John Yarmuth (D-KY) said in a statement. Slate reported that the deal was a promise not to stop the confirmation of two U.S. attorneys in exchange for Meredith — effectively two temporary political appointees for a lifetime seat on the federal bench.
However, Chad is just one part of our problem. There may be no seat for him right now, but Democrats are on track to leave more than 60 open judicial seats for McConnell to fill if the GOP retakes the Senate, including NINE in California(!). This needs to be addressed NOW!
Action #1: Tell your senators that voting for Chad Meredith, or ANY FEDERALIST SOCIETY MEMBER, is a racist and anti-democratic action. AND START FILLING THOSE VACANCIES!
Federalist Society nominees are committed to protecting the structure of racism – the interests of corporations and the richest 1%. Under the cover of strengthening states’ rights, their true mission is suppressing voting rights, removing health care and safety net access, degrading labor rights and worker protections, militarizing police, impoverishing public education, and permitting the poisoning of the very air we breathe and the water we drink. They are the judicial backstop behind every choke-hold that goes awry, every shooting of an unarmed person, and now, the removal of bodily sovereignty of women.
The six of them on the Supreme Court may even end democracy.
Minimal script for senators: I’m calling from [zip code] and I want Sen. [___] to vote “NO” to Federalist Society member and forced-birth advocate Chad Meredith. A vote for any Federalist member is a racist and anti-democratic action. I also want [him/her/them] to demand that the Senate Judiciary Committee schedule additional hearings for vacant judicial seats and add to the number of nominees who can be considered at each hearing so that there are no open seats before the midterms. The GOP understand the value of judges. Now, we do too.
CONTACT INFO.
Action #2: Call Biden.
CONTACT INFO.: https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/
Sample script: Tell President Biden to rescind the deal with McConnell to place Chad Meredith for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky or any other Federalist Society member and/or forced-birth advocate. And also tell him to demand that the Judiciary Committee speed up hearings for vacant seats, so that none are left open in November.
Action #3: Write Biden.
Dear Joe.
We hear that on the same day Federalist acolytes on the Supreme Court threw out Roe v. Wade, you were considering a deal with Sen. McConnell to get two temporary political appointee district attorneys in exchange for a lifetime seat for Chad Meredith, ANOTHER forced-birther Federalist Society member, who could wreak havoc on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky for decades.
It’s no longer a just a hypothesis that Society members are a serious threat to our country remaining a democracy. “The leading voices of the [Federalist] Society share an ideology that is hostile to civil rights, reproductive rights, religious liberties, environmental protection, privacy rights, and health and safety standards, and would strip our federal government of the power to enforce these rights and protections. While individual members of the Society may hold different views, the driving force of the Society-its leadership-is united behind this extreme ideology. Even the words that define the purpose of government and the courts for ordinary people, fundamental values such as “fairness” and “tolerance,” have been called into dispute.” (tinyurl.com/Fed-society-anti-democratic)
Abortion is hanging by a thread in Kentucky and judges like Meredith could end it. Instead of making deals with scoundrels, concentrate on filling the more than 60 judicial vacancies Democrats may leave open at the end of this year. There are more than 80 judicial vacancies without nominees, out of 119 announced vacancies, including nine district court vacancies in California – don’t give McConnell a chance to fill them! Enforce deadlines in states where senators are moving too slowly and get this work done, blue slips be damned. Demand that the Senate Judiciary Committee schedule additional hearings and add to the number of nominees who can be considered at each hearing. The GOP understands the value of judges. Now, we do too.
INDIVISIBLE VENTURA 