President Trump picks Brett Kavanaugh as his next SCOTUS pick.

President Donald Trump and Brett Kavanaugh at the announcement. Reuters. 

President Donald Trump has picked Brett Kavanaugh as his replacement for Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. Reuters. Kavanaugh is a conservative appellate judge who served on Ken Starr's investigation into President Bill Clinton. However, Kavanaugh later said that presidents should not be under investigation during their terms. Kavanaugh is set to make the court more conservative. Currently the court has a 5-4 majority for conservatives but Anthony Kennedy was often a swing vote. Kavanaugh is less likely to be so and now faces a tough confirmation battle. With John McCain unlikely to vote, he will need every single Republican to confirm him. 

My Comment:

A reasonable pick for SCOTUS. I think that Kavanaugh will be a good member of the Supreme Court and will serve for quite some time. He's relatively young too at 54 and probably has 25-30 years if he gets confirmed. 

I also think that he should be confirmed. Unlike other nominees, Kavanaugh is unlikely to rule against Roe vs Wade. That was a major stumbling block for Susan Collins of Maine. She had said that she wouldn't support a candidate that wanted to overturn the ruling but that stumbling block is out of the way. With her and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska on board that leaves 50 Republicans probably on board. John McCain probably won't vote, either for health reasons or for pure spite against President Trump and I doubt any Democrats will cross over to support Kavanaugh. That means that he has enough votes to pass but just barely. 

The battle will be horrible though. I fully expect that the media and the Democratic leadership will throw a temper tantrum over this nomination and a quick perusal of Twitter shows that it is already happening. The Democrats are pretty much powerless to stop the confirmation though unless they can convince a 2nd Republican to not support him. I don't see that happening, but there is going to be a lot of pressure on more liberal members of the GOP Senate.

That means that there is going to be a big push by the Democrats and their media allies. They are already trying to point Kavanaugh as an extremist. They are also trying to make a big deal about the fact that Kavanaugh doesn't support investigations into the president. This is just a bunch of sound and fury though as there is little chance that they can block this nomination. 

As for policy, I like Kavanaugh for one reason and one reason only. He's a strong supporter of the 2nd amendment. He has ruled against assault weapons bans and gun registration schemes and is likely to strike down laws that are similar. He might also push the court to actually rule on gun rights. The current court has not been taking 2nd amendment cases but that could change if Kavanaugh gets confirmed. 

On other issues I am less sure which way Kavanaugh will go. It's pretty clear he's more moderate than Trump's other candidates on abortion rights which means Roe vs Wade isn't going anywhere though I do think he might support more regulations. Kavanaugh might not be the best justice on 4th amendment rights as he usually sides with the government when it comes to search and seizures. As for immigration I have no idea. But again, as long as the 2nd amendment is protected I am happy and if Kavanaugh gets confirmed it should be safe for another generation. 

The real question is what happens when Ruth Bader Ginsburg dies or retires. At this point she seems to be holding on by pure spite alone, much like John McCain, even if it would be a better result for her to enjoy her remaining time in retirement. Once she is gone Trump will get another SCOTUS pick and one that will likely give the court a 6-3 majority for a very long time. With another liberal justice, Stephen Breyer, getting up their in years there is even a chance at a 7-2 court which would last a generation. 

I also want to point out to the "never Trump" crowd that opposed Trump so hard, that they should be very happy with Trump's two SCOTUS picks. Both Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh are great conservative picks that aren't that different from what Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio would have picked. The difference is that Trump was actually able to win...