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Guest opinion: Romney betraying his party, constituents with votes

By Gabe Ure - Special to the Daily Herald | Apr 9, 2022

On Wednesday, Sen. Mitt Romney voted to send Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court alongside two other Republicans. In doing so, he turned his back on many of his constituents while also betraying the Republican party.

For starters, despite mainstream media’s attempts to convince otherwise, Jackson is a very radical nominee. Her radical views were on exhibit when she told Sen. Blackburn that she could not define the word “woman.” Apparently, you need to be a biologist to do that nowadays.

Her soft rulings in cases involving child pornography and pedophilia have also exposed her more radical side. Furthermore, she has a history of acting while lacking jurisdiction. According to Sen. Mike Lee, Jackson went beyond her authority in two separate cases when she ruled to invalidate Trump administration executive actions. She was overturned by a higher court in both cases.

Radical views aside, Romney should not be voting for Jackson as she is a guaranteed Democrat vote. In the last few decades, the Supreme Court has dramatically increased its powers and jurisdiction and is now often the final say in new policy and legislation, overriding both Congress and the White House.

And the stark reality is that the court is overtly political. The justices, especially the Democrat-nominated ones, can be and are expected to vote strictly along party lines. Pretending otherwise is silly and dangerous.

This is why nowadays, nominees’ “qualifications” do not matter as much. What matters much more is whether the nominee is in line with the party in power and will be a consistent vote for them. As such, a vote to confirm Jackson is a vote in favor of all of her future rulings, which will be liberal and not in line with conservative beliefs.

Two more issues make Romney’s vote hard to understand. First, less than a year ago, he voted against her appointment to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. And second, while effectively endorsing Jackson by voting for her, Romney has refused to endorse his fellow Utah senator, Mike Lee, who is currently running against Democrat-backed independent Evan McMullin.

For these reasons among others, Romney’s vote to confirm Jackson makes no sense. It was also unnecessary, as Jackson had enough backers to get through the Senate without Romney. However, it is not surprising. Since being elected senator, Romney has consistently voted in a way that most of his constituency does not favor.

Just last month, Sen. Romney voted in favor of the continued masking of children as young as 2. A day later, he joined Democrats as the only Republican to vote against repealing President Biden’s yearlong public transportation mask mandate. Both mask mandates are wildly unpopular with Republicans.

Late last year, Romney voted for Biden’s $1 trillion infrastructure bill that has nearly nothing to do with infrastructure and is estimated to add $256 billion to the U.S. deficit over the next 10 years. He also voted to approve an amendment to the “Bankrupting Americans Act” that changed Senate rules to allow Democrats to pass a debt ceiling increase among other things.

And it gets worse. Despite accepting Donald Trump’s endorsement while running for senator in 2018, Romney promptly voted not once, but twice to impeach Trump. In fact, the first time he voted to impeach Trump he made history as the first-ever senator to vote to remove a president of his own party from office.

In these examples and many others, Romney has continually disappointed and confused his constituents while also betraying the Republican Party. Romney needs to either change his views, which he seems to do with ease, or prepare for some stiff resistance in the coming 2024 elections. I, for my part, will not be voting for Romney unless I see some drastic changes.

Gabe Ure is a student at Brigham Young University and previously volunteered for Sen. Romney’s 2018 campaign.

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