In two great responses, Judge Amy Coney Barrett destroyed Dick Durbin after he attempted to twist one of her judicial opinions into something it was not and also tried to force her to give an opinion on the president’s actions.
In the first exchange, Durbin accuses Barrett of treating the right to vote as a second class right next to the 2nd amendment right to bear arms:
Sen. Durbin tried to distort Judge Barrett's position on voting rights through her dissent in Kanter v. Barr.
Judge Barrett: "It is a distortion of the case to say that I ever said that voting is a second class right…Kanter had nothing to do with the right to vote." pic.twitter.com/gKXdnIlMnb
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) October 14, 2020
To make his point Durbin challenged her, saying that she concluded the right to vote could be removed after someone commits a felony, but the right to bear arms could only be removed after the commission of a violent felony.
Barrett responded by pointing out that Durbin was twisting her words and that’s not what she said, noting that she wasn’t giving one right preeminence over another right or treating the right to vote like a second class right, but explaining that the right to bear arms is an individual right, which benefits the individual, and the right to vote is a civic right, which benefits the whole of society.
Durbin challenged her again saying “When you finished with your dissent, here’s what it came down to say. If you are guilty of a felony that is not violent, you can lose your right to vote, but you can’t lose your right to buy a gun. Am I wrong?”
That’s when Barrett lowered the boom, saying “Senator, Kanter had nothing to do with the right to vote. The point that I was making in that passage – the fourteenth amendment actually expressly allows for states to deprive felons of the right to vote and my point was that there was no similar language in the second amendment. I don’t have an opinion and have never expressed one about the scope of a legislature’s authority to take away felon voting rights.”
In a second clip, Durbin tries to force Barrett to give an opinion on whether President Trump can unilaterally deny someone the right to vote based on race or gender:
Watch Judge Amy Coney Barrett put Sen. Dick Durbin in his place: pic.twitter.com/d9YGQEDZtO
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) October 14, 2020
Barrett explained that she’d already cited that the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments that prohibit discrimination on the basis of race in voting.
Durbin pushes her to explicitly weigh in on whether President Trump can unilaterally deny someone the right to vote based on race or gender, and she responds that she isn’t going to address hypotheticals.
Durbin, having cited that she’s a textualist and originalist, tries to put Barrett into a corner by acting incredulous that she won’t remark on this, which he earlier said is directly from the text of the Constitution: “It strains originalism that the clear wording of the Constitution establishes a right and you will not acknowledge it.”
Once again, Barrett lowers the boom on Durbin, saying “Well it would strain the canons of conduct, which don’t permit me to offer off-the-cuff reactions or any opinions outside of the judicial decision making process. It would strain article three which prevents me from deciding legal issues outside the context of cases and controversies and as Justice Ginsburg said, it would display disregard for the whole judicial process.”
Not only does Barrett use the Constitution against Durbin, like she did before, she threw in Justice Ginsburg’s statement which was really just icing on her badass smackdown cake. And she did it all without breaking a sweat.