This week, Mitch McConnell filed cloture on a vote to confirm Stephen Schwartz to the Court of Federal Claims.
This nominee's record is ATROCIOUS, so it's time for a thread about what it means if Senate Republicans vote to confirm him.
This nominee's record is ATROCIOUS, so it's time for a thread about what it means if Senate Republicans vote to confirm him.
2. If you've never heard of the CFC, it's sometimes called "the People's Court." It hears monetary claims against the government from contracts, regulations, and more. The goal is to balance government actions with citizen protection, and Schwartz could do great damage there.
3. Schwartz's nomination has been lingering for YEARS, and there's a reason: his record is incredibly disturbing. Moreover, we've learned even more this past year about just how bad it is in writings he originally concealed: afj.org/article/new-wr…
4. For example, Schwartz wants to privatize Social Security and eliminate ALL health care and social programs. People who depend on such programs, he wrote, "are inevitably somewhat less than fully mature adults." 
5. In the same article, he also claimed that making sure the elderly are able to live comfortably with access to health care is *NOT* "a worthwhile goal for the government to undertake."
6. In a separate article — for a column cloyingly called "Always Right" — Schwartz advocated for completely eliminating the entire Departments of Transportation, Education, and Agriculture and all of the programs they oversee.
7. Remember that Supreme Court case this year (June Medical Services) where the Supreme Court just barely rejected Louisiana's latest abortion restrictions? Schwartz filed a brief in the case defending the restrictions: supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/18/1…
8. And in the Hobby Lobby case from a few years back, Schwartz filed a brief arguing corporations should be able to receive religious exemptions to deny employees birth control coverage: afj.org/wp-content/upl…
9. When North Carolina was trying to defend its Voter ID laws that very clearly targeted Black voters, Schwartz was there again to defend the discriminatory law: scotusblog.com/wp-content/upl…
10. And when a Virginia school was fighting for the right to discriminate against transgender student Gavin Grimm, Schwartz was on record arguing that segregating trans kids is a-ok with him: scotusblog.com/wp-content/upl…
11. Schwartz has absolutely no business being anywhere near the courts, least of all serving on one designed specifically to protect the people of this country. That's why we issued a new letter of opposition today: afj.org/wp-content/upl…
12. Moreover, it's December. The election was a full month ago and Biden decisively won. Why is the Senate still confirming Trump's judicial nominees? An Obama nominee last received a vote in July 2016, and his CFC nominees *never* received a floor vote.
13. It's as clear as ever how McConnell doesn't care how the people voted; he just wants to grab as much power on the courts as he can. We need to #StopSchwartz and the incredible damage we know he wants to do to our country. #CourtsMatter /thread
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