“We’re not packing the Court; we’re unpacking it,” Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) boldly claimed on Thursday after the unveiling of the Judiciary Act of 2021, a bill that seeks to expand the Supreme Court by four seats. Nadler, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, stood with his fellow cosponsors behind a lectern adorned with a banner that read “Expand the Court”—the Democrats’ lame attempt at rebranding their blatant power-grab.
Sadly, congressional Democrats are not alone in deluding themselves about what court-packing really is and which party has or is currently trying to pack the court. Several left-wing blue-checks on Twitter have been pushing the myth that Democrats aren’t the ones trying to pack the court, that it was Republicans who packed the court.
How did Republicans “pack the court.” according to the left? By filling vacancies, which, simply put, is not what court-packing is.
Merriam-Webster defines court-packing as “the act or practice of packing a court and especially the United States Supreme Court by increasing the number of judges or justices in an attempt to change the ideological makeup of the court.” While there have been some recent attempts to alter the definition of court-packing, this is the longstanding accepted definition.
But the left is trying to pretend that Democrats aren’t in the middle of a power grab and are simply trying to reform the court.
Republicans packed the courts. Court reform is now needed to clean up the mess they made. https://t.co/xDmI2ThN9d
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) April 10, 2021
The guy who unilaterally rewrote the rules to pack the Supreme Court with conservatives is suddenly very concerned about the sanctity of the court.
— Brian Tyler Cohen (@briantylercohen) April 9, 2021
Truly astonishing to hear Mitch McConnell & Senate Republicans decry “court packing” after they stole 2 Supreme Court seats for Trump & blocked 110 Obama judicial nominees
— Ari Berman (@AriBerman) April 15, 2021
REMINDER: GOP has been aggressively trying to pack supreme courts at state level, study says #SupremeCourt https://t.co/eoBDv3IjGV
— (((DeanObeidallah))) (@DeanObeidallah) April 15, 2021
Court packing:
Since 1969, Democratic presidents have appointed 4 Supreme Court justices, Republicans have appointed 16 (5 of them by presidents who lost the popular vote).
McConnell refused to even hold a hearing on Obama's nominee.
— Robert Reich (@RBReich) April 15, 2021
Just a reminder that Mitch McConnell blocked Merrick Garland 8 months before an election but confirmed Amy Coney Barrett 8 days before an election when 65 million people had already voted.
Court packing is the Republican playbook.
— Adriano Espaillat (@RepEspaillat) April 15, 2021
Every time Republicans opine about Democratic efforts to pack the Supreme Court the response needs to be that REPUBLICANS ALREADY PACKED THE COURT when they refused to give Merrick Garland a vote and forced Amy Coney Barrett through as Americans were voting in a general election
— Seth Abramson (@SethAbramson) April 15, 2021
Peak Democrat is having a years-long high-profile discussion in the national media of court-packing plans that stand no chance of passing.
Republicans just sometimes do the packing quickly in state supreme courts when they want to, never publish long takes about it.
— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) April 16, 2021
Sorry, libs, but you can’t change the definition of court-packing to suit your needs. What the Democrats are trying to do now is court-packing. Republicans filling vacancies in the judiciary is not court-packing.
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