Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Washington braced for supreme court fight – live

Richard Luscombe has news of Democrats hoping to reach out across the aisle following Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death.

Delaware’s Democratic senator Chris Coons says he hopes to persuade several Republican “friends” in the upper chamber to resist the rushing through of Donald Trump’s supreme court nominee, claiming a swift confirmation would “dishonor Justice Ginsburg’s legacy.”

“Her dying wish was that the voters should choose the next president, the next president should choose her successor, that’s because she understood deeply our constitution and the significance of the supreme court and its legitimacy,” he said on Fox News Sunday.

“I’m going to be working this week to reach across the aisle to see if I can’t persuade some friends to respect tradition, to respect the precedent they set in 2016 and let the voters decide.”

Challenged by host Chris Wallace why Democrats demanded a vote on Barack Obama’s nominee Merrick Garland in that election year, yet now wanted to delay Trump’s choice, Coons insisted the situation was different.

“In 25 states across our country Americans are already voting,” he said, pointing out that Garland’s nomination was nine months before election day.

“For the Republican majority, just 44 days before the next presidential election, to rush through a new justice in a partisan confirmation process will further divide our country. [They] set this new precedent, they fought hard for it, so if they were going to set a precedent that in an election year there shouldn’t be a hearing, meetings, votes, they should live by it. Fair is fair.”

In 2016, Republicans blocked Barack Obama’s nominee to the supreme court in the run-up to the presidential election. This year, they are preparing to rush through Donald Trump’s nominee before the presidential election. How voters react to this seeming hypocrisy remains to be seen. In an appearance on CNN’s State of the Union, Marc Short, Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff, is asked if these tactics could hurt Republican senators in close races in November.

“As far as the politics of it, I think the American people wanted Donald Trump to make nominations,” Short says.

More from House speaker Nancy Pelosi on ABC’s This Week. Host George Stephanopoulos asks her about scenarios in which Democrats would seek to block a Republican nomination to fill the vacancy left on the supreme court by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg

“Some have mentioned the possibility if [Republicans] try to push through a nominee in a lame duck session that you and the House can move to impeach President Trump or Attorney General Barr as a way of stalling and preventing the Senate from acting on this nomination,” says Stephanopoulos.

Pelosi does not rule out that possibility. “Well, we have our options. We have arrows in our quiver that I’m not about to discuss right now, but the fact is we have a big challenge in our country. This president has threatened to not even accept the results of the election with statements that he and his henchmen have made,” she says.

Stephanopoulos presses Pelosi again, asking if she “not ruling anything out”.

“Yeah,” she says. “We have a responsibility. We’ve taken an oath to protect and defend the constitution of the United States. We have a responsibility to meet the needs of the American people.

“That is when we weigh the equities of protecting our democracy requires us to use every arrow in our quiver.”

The Associated Press has news of a crucial Senate race in Arizona:

If he wins a Senate seat in Arizona, the former astronaut Mark Kelly could take office as early as 30 November, an outcome which might jeopardize the launch of Donald Trump’s third supreme court nominee.

The Democrat has maintained a polling lead over the Republican Martha McSally, who was appointed to the seat held by John McCain, who died in 2018. Because the contest is a special election to finish McCain’s term, the winner could be sworn in as soon as the results are certified. Other winners in November’s contest, in which Democrats hope to retake the Senate, will not take office until January.

Trump has pledged to nominate a replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died on Friday, and Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has vowed that the nominee “will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate”.

If Kelly wins, when he takes office could be crucial in deciding the ensuing nomination fight. Republicans currently hold the chamber by 53 seats to 47. The prospect of falling to 52 could prompt McConnell to speed up the nomination process.

With McSally in the Senate, four defections would defeat a nomination. A tie vote could be broken by Vice-President Mike Pence. Within hours of the announcement of Ginsberg’s death, McSally declared that “this US Senate should vote on President Trump’s next nominee for the US supreme court”.

She has not elaborated on whether the vote should come before or after the election. But she highlighted the renewed stakes of her race in a fundraising pitch on Saturday.

“If Mark Kelly comes out on top, HE could block President Trump’s supreme court Nominee from being confirmed,” McSally wrote.

In the 2018 midterms, Democrats found success in Arizona, long dominated by the GOP, by appealing to Republicans and independents disaffected with Trump. The supreme court vacancy could boost McSally by keeping those voters in her camp.

Kelly said late on Saturday: “The people elected to the presidency and Senate in November should fill this vacancy. When it comes to making a lifetime appointment to the supreme court, Washington shouldn’t rush that process for political purposes.”

Arizona law requires election results to be certified on the fourth Monday after the election, which falls this year on 30 November. The certification could be delayed up to three days if the state has not received election results from any of its 15 counties.

Bill Clinton has been busy this morning. Shortly after his appearance on CNN, he pops up on CBS’s Face The Nation.

He is asked by host Margaret Brennan why he nominated Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the supreme court during his presidency.

“I wanted somebody who was open minded, passionately committed to equality and capable of working in the setting of the supreme court – that is getting to know the other judges, getting to know how they felt and working with them to try to forge consensus when possible,” he says.

Republicans are preparing to rush through a conservative successor to Ginsburg before November’s election, and Democrats are hoping to delay the process until afterwards. Clinton is asked who he thinks will be galvanized more by current events – Republicans or Democrats.

“I think that the voters at least have to know that if you put one more conservative, particularly an ideologically conservative Republican on the court, they’re giving up the healthcare bill for, you know, 20 million people’s health insurance, losing all the preexisting conditions for tens and tens of millions of people. No help on the other front. That’s just one example. So there are consequences,” he says.

Joe Biden retains his lead over Donald Trump nationally, according to a new NBC/Wall Street Journal poll. Biden leads the president 51% to 43% in the new poll, with the challenger’s lead narrowing slightly from the last NBC/Wall Street Journal poll when Biden led 50% to 41%.

Biden is up in the so-called battleground states – Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – but the margin is smaller, with the Democrat nominee leading 51% to 45%.

Joe Biden has an appearance scheduled in Philadelphia today. He will speak about the supreme court of justice and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, according to CNN’s Arlette Saenz.

Alaska Republican senator Lisa Murkowski said on Friday, before the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg had been announced, that if there was a vacancy on the supreme court she would not vote to confirm a nominee before November’s election. That, of course, would go against Donald Trump’s – and most Republicans’ – wish to get a (conservative) successor to Ginsburg in before the election.

On Sunday morning Trump appeared to react to Murkowski’s comments. “No thanks!” he tweeted in reply to a promotion for a public appearance by the senator.

The internet duly lit up on Saturday after Donald Trump, speaking to reporters on leaving the White House for a rally in North Carolina, illustrated his promise to pick a woman for the supreme court with hand gestures which appeared to outline the shape of a woman’s body.

Amy Coney Barrett and Barbara Lagoa are reported to be top of the president’s list of possible replacements for Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

“A woman would be in first place, yes,” the president said on Saturday, making the gesture. “The choice of a woman I would say would certainly be appropriate.”

Trump has made inappropriate gestures when speaking about women before. At an October 2016 rally in Greensboro, North Carolina – then as now a swing state – Trump made groping gestures while discussing allegations of sexual misconduct against him.

This week, Emily Dorris, by some counts Trump’s 26th accuser of sexual misconduct detailed her allegations to the Guardian. As with all the other accusations, Trump denied them.