Goodbye Merrick Garland

by Deacon Blues

For every white voter the GOP and Trump try to scare to the polls this November with a call to lock in long-term anti-immigration efforts through a whiter Supreme Court, there will be several other voters that Democrats can also drive to the polls, thanks to the deadlocked SCOTUS ruling today blocking Obama's executive order.

Trust me, it will be quite easy to drive millions of Latino voters to the polls knowing that a Texas circuit court's ruling is the law of the land, and forces the deportation and breakup of thousands of families across the country. All this decision does is ensure even more overreach and ugliness from Trump and the GOP against brown people. I don't expect Beltway pundits to acknowledge that, but the actual political effect of today's ruling will be quite stark this November.

Make no mistake: I think Obama was wrong in what he did, and overreached himself here. But if anyone thinks this will help the GOP and Trump win the presidency, they're delusional.

And yes, this dooms the Merrick Garland nomination, because the GOP will now hold out to wait for Trump to (hopefully) nominate a desired white guy. But when Hillary rams someone else down their throats next year who is less to their liking, they will look back at this time as a missed opportunity to let a moderate through.