Dear John,

They did it. They actually did it.

The Senate Judiciary Committee just voted to approve the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court.

This utterly illegitimate power grab must not be allowed to stand, and we're going all out in the final days of this campaign to hold the Republican senators who voted for Amy Coney Barrett accountable.

Will you make a donation to Inequality Media and support our work in this crucial time for our democracy?

Republicans rushed this nomination through literally days before an election, leaving no time for any serious consideration of her record.

They violated their own precedent, set just two years ago, that the president shouldn't be allowed to nominate a Supreme Court Justice in their last year.

Even today, they broke the rules by ignoring a committee boycott by the Democratic members and holding the vote despite a rule requiring two members of the opposing party to be present to conduct business.

The odds of defeating Coney Barrett's confirmation on the full Senate floor appear to be zero. But this fight is not over. Not remotely.

First, we must end Mitch McConnell's control of the U.S. Senate by holding every Republican senator accountable for railroading this nomination through. Unless Trump and McConnell are defeated, no other solutions can move forward.

Second, we must push back hard against Republicans' and the media's claim that any effort to reform or rebalance the Court would be unfair "court-packing." Republicans have been packing the courts with hard-core partisan ideologues for decades.

If President Biden is elected, he or another future president can and must take action to restore credibility to the courts. There are many approaches, including expanding the Supreme Court through a bipartisan system to add seats or by drawing additional justices from the courts of appeals on a rotating basis. Additionally, they could establish a code of ethics for justices. None of these steps would violate the Constitution or even precedent, since the size of the Court has been changed many times over U.S. history.

Should Judge Barrett be confirmed next week as expected, this GOP-packed court is poised to strip health care from 20 million Americans, overturn Roe v. Wade, eliminate marriage equality, and perhaps even affect the outcome of this election. The stakes could not be higher.

Will you donate to support our critical work?

Together, we will fight back against GOP court-packing and hold every Republican accountable for this outrageous abuse of power.

Thanks for all you do,

Robert Reich                                      
Inequality Media Civic Action         

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