Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy announced Wednesday he will step down from the bench on July 31, giving liberals everywhere heart failure while handing President Trump the reins to the court for conservative control.
How freaking awesome is that?!
We’re not dissing Justice Kennedy, who is a Reagan nominee, but he did cross the conservative line on numerous controversial issues and became known as a swing vote on far too many decisions.
Kennedy was there for conservatives on the issue of Trump’s travel ban, and ruled against the Colorado Civil Rights Commission and in favor of Colorado baker Jack Phillips.
However, Kennedy sided with liberals on key decisions involving the death penalty and wrote the opinion making gay marriage legal.
In the last few sessions, pollster Scott Rasmussen says Kennedy sided with liberals 65 percent of the time.
With Kennedy’s exit, believe or not, Colorado has another shot at getting one of our own sworn onto the high court.
Trump’s short list includes Timothy Tymkovich and Allison Eid, both judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit.
Tymkovich is the chief judge and comes with solid conservative credentials.
He was appointed to his post by President George W. Bush and also served as solicitor general under state Attorney General Gale Norton.
Eid was nominated to the court by Trump, so she already has the needed experience with the Senate confirmation process in this age of obnoxious incivility by Democrats who loath all things Trump.
Even U.S. Sen. Michael Bennett voted for her — a home-state courtesy vote he denied Neil Gorsuch, who was Trump’s first nomination to the Supreme Court.
The million-dollar question will be whether Trump would nominate another Coloradan to the Supreme Court.
It seems unlikely, but there’s only 25 names on the short list representing 16 states, and our two judges are officially in the running, so it’s certainly a possibility.
Some pundits are pitching Judge Brett Kavanaugh as the presumed frontrunner, who just so happened to be a former clerk for Kennedy. Kavanaugh was added to the short list in November.
Before our liberal readers (we know who you are) start screaming that a deal was made between Trump and Kennedy for his retirement, keep in mind that Gorsuch also clerked for Kennedy. And, Trump added four other names to his list when he added Kavanaugh.