Former MSNBC journalist Luke Russert on Thursday unleashed a series of liberal talking point Tweets about the “unprecedented” effort to override a Democratic filibuster of Neil Gorsuch. Russert, who posed as a supposedly neutral journalist during his tenure at MSNBC, also hit Republicans for “stealing” Merrick Garland’s opening at the Supreme Court.
Russert whined, “UNPRECEDENTED-How the #GOP used the filibuster to stop Obama & steal a Supreme Court pick.” Apparently no one informed him of what happened to Miguel Estrada. Nominated by George W. Bush in 2001 to the U.S. Court of Appeals, Democrats filibustered him. True, he wasn't a Supreme Court nominee, but blocking him led to what happened on Thursday.
Additionally, Republicans in 2016 didn’t use the filibuster to stop Garland. They simply didn’t bring his nomination up for a vote. Later, Russert tweeted, “Obama's pick Garland, can't even get a hearing. UNPRECEDENTED never seen in #USA history.”
This ignores the Democratic support for not considering a nomination during a presidential election year. In 1992, then-Senator Joe Biden gave a speech declaring, “Once the political season is underway, and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over.”
In 2008, Russert reported that the “smartest” college kids natuarlly favored Barack Obama. (He later apologized and said he misspoke.) Russert suddenly resigned from MSNBC (and journalism) in the summer of 2016. Clearly, he’s still the same liberal cheerleader.
